Too Many Injuries, Not Enough Love
by Klarolineluvr34
Summary: For months, New Orleans has been considered a dangerous place and maybe it is, just not for Lizzie Saltzman, who is either very courageous or very stupid to have the need to investigate why. (Warning: This is my opinion on season 2 and some moments I wrote I kind of want to see)
1. Making and Breaking Promises

Lizzie was sitting in her dad's office being scolded for asking an 'out of line' question.

"Absolutely not Lizzie! It is way too dangerous!" Alaric yells very annoyed with his daughter's latest request.

"You'd let Josie go, so clearly you have favorites." Lizzie responds with bitterness as she pouts about her father's disapproval.

"No I wouldn't and also I don't have favorites, the only thing I do have is the need to keep my daughters safe." Alaric states which seems to soften Lizzie a bit, but not enough to lose the argument.

"Ok, but I need to go there for something." Lizzie pleads trying to appeal to her father by begging, which just annoys him.

"It's not going to happen, Lizzie. I don't want you to take a single step into New Orleans, do you understand me?" Alaric asks demandingly and Lizzie thinks for a moment before answering.

"I understand daddy. I promise I won't take a single step into New Orleans." Lizzie pouts, upset that she lost the argument yet Alaric seems pleased by this promise.

"Ok now go, I don't want you to miss lunch." Alaric advises causing Lizzie to stand and walk out of his office still pouting.

Once Lizzie leaves, closing the door behind her, her pouty frown turns into a wide smile and it continues to be a wide smile especially when she sees M.G., who she runs up to.

"Hey MG." Lizzie says excitedly as she holds her school books to her chest.

"Hey Lizzie, you're cheerful." MG claims taking notice of the blonde's mood.

"Well, I need a favor." Lizzie explains catching MG's attention and confusing him.

"What kind of a favor do you need?" MG asks clearly confused but this question just makes Lizzie smile again, however this one more devious looking.

"I'm so glad you asked." Lizzie says still smiling as she cutely tilts her head, making MG concerned.

"I need to get something very important and it happens to be off campus." Lizzie explains, making MG curious.

"So, do you want me to get it for you or did you want me to tag along on your journey?" MG wonders, confused.

"Neither. I need you to ensure my dad and sister don't know I'm gone." Lizzie claims, confusing MG more.

"I don't understand. What exactly do you want me to do?" MG questions, voicing his confusion which makes Lizzie roll her eyes.

"Okay, so if they ask you where I am, tell them that I went exploring in the woods around campus." Lizzie advises and MG stares at her in horror and realization.

"You want me to lie to your sister and the Headmaster?" MG gapes at her as though she's insane but she just smiles at him in return.

"I can't. Much like you, Josie is going to see right through me and know that I'm lying." MG explains, clearly not cooperative, making Lizzie sigh then reach into her pocket, pull out some cash from her wallet, and hand it to MG in her clenched fist.

"Now, will you do it?" Lizzie asks, impatiently, and MG quickly grabs the money from her.

"Just please promise me that you won't get hurt, or worse." MG pleads, worried about Lizzie.

"I promise. Wait, does that mean you'll do it?" Lizzie wonders, enthusiasm in her tone, while MG reluctantly nods, agreeing with her plan.

"Ohh, yay. Thanks MG." Lizzie exclaims happily then she kisses his cheek before skipping off to do her part.

MG watches her skip away as he has a dopey look from the fact that she just kissed his cheek, before continuing to walk to lunch.

Lizzie sneaks into her dad's office, via the window, and steals his car keys, which were on his desk, then sneaks back out the window, closing it behind her when she does.

Then Lizzie runs to her dad's car, hops in it, starts it, and drives away from the school to get what she needs.

After a few hours of using backroads, Lizzie makes it to Louisiana, just outside of New Orleans, to be exact.

Lizzie gets out of the car after turning it off and grabbing a flashlight as New Orleans looks dark and gloomy compared to literally just outside of it.

"I'm so sorry, dad." Lizzie mutters an apology under her breath, turns on her flashlight, then gulps and holds her breath, before stepping foot into New Orleans.

Meanwhile back on campus, MG spent the past few hours avoiding Josie and the headmaster until Penelope Park confronted him, at Josie's request.

"Milton. We need to talk." Penelope demands, confusing yet also intimidating MG.

"About what?" MG is so confused about this confrontation.

"Josie claims that you've been avoiding her. Why?" Penelope wonders causing MG to gulp nervously before recovering and playing dumb.

"Me? Avoiding Josie? I would never." MG claims and Penelope seems to believe this, but she keeps questioning him.

"Have you seen Lizzie?" Penelope wonders, this question implying that Josie wanted her to ask him about this.

"Lizzie, hmm. I talked to her a couple hours ago. She said something about wanting to explore the woods around and off campus." MG stuck with the lie that Lizzie had to pay him to tell, even though he hated lying to his friends, Penelope included.

"That's odd. I didn't know Lizzie even liked the woods. Oh well." Penelope shrugs it off then walks away, leaving MG feeling guilty that he just lied to her.

Penelope just strides into Josie's dorm room, where Josie is sitting on her bed.

Penelope plops on the bed, sitting across from her, and grabs a pillow, that she starts fiddling with.

"So, what'd MG say? Does he know where Lizzie is?" Josie interrogates, visibly anxious about Lizzie.

"MG said that he talked to her a few hours ago and she apparently said something about exploring around campus in the woods." Penelope responds, still fiddling with the pillow but this answer worries Josie more.

"We aren't supposed to explore the woods around campus. Ughh, Lizzie and her adventure-seeking self." Josie gets off the bed, catching Penelope's attention, as she puts the pillow on her lap.

"Where are you going?" Penelope asks, confused, causing Josie to turn to face her.

"I'm going to go look for Lizzie." Josie replies plainly, as though it were obvious, causing Penelope rolls her eyes before putting the pillow on the bed and standing up.

"Not alone, you aren't. I'm coming with you." Penelope claims and follows Josie out of the dorm room to go look for Lizzie.


	2. Dangerous Circumstances

In New Orleans, Lizzie walks down the abandoned street with her flashlight faced down at the road, where she sees bare footprints on one side but wolf's paw prints on the other, indicating a werewolf resides there.

There's blood everywhere, as that is what makes the two different prints on the street.

There are also drag marks, blood smeared all over the streets, which is completely revolting to Lizzie.

Then she sees a sign that reads 'Jardin Gris Voodoo Shop' and Lizzie smiles at it, thinking it will have what she needs inside.

So, Lizzie cautiously walks to the shop, only to be horrified by bloody handprints all over the door, the wall around it and the doorknob itself, as though this the place every injured person goes before being dragged off, as there are blood drag marks in front of and on both sides of the door.

However, the people dragged away while on the sides, clearly tried to hold onto the door and exterior wall as there are bloody handprints dragging along it.

Lizzie shutters in fear at the sight then, using her sleeve, she opens the door and walks inside, leaving the door open for an easy exit.

The store looks untouched, like outside the fact the lights don't work, there's no blood or any indication that anyone goes in there at all, which explains all of the blood outside the door.

She looks around the abandoned shop, not seeming to find the thing she needs, so she leaves and closes the door behind her, using her sleeve again.

Lizzie keeps walking the streets, then she realizes something.

"Wait. Everything here is abandoned, dead, and covered in blood. Except the plants." Lizzie thinks aloud yet she was right, the entire city had looked dead, except the grass and the plants, basically all the nature was still alive compared to just about everything else there.

Lizzie continues to look around when her flashlight beams on a building, then she moves the light up to the sign that reads 'Rousseaus'.

"That must be a restaurant." Lizzie murmurs under her breath before slowly walking towards the entrance, but stops in her tracks when she sees more bloody drag marks of both bodies and handprints.

Lizzie looks absolutely terrified but she swallows her fear down and confidently walks into the restaurant, only for her horror and fear to return when she sees completely mutilated, dismembered bodies.

She looks around, gaping in horror at the damage, when something vamp speeds behind her causing her to turn around.

She continues looking at the now closed doors, even though she left them open, before something vamp speeds behind her again, causing her to turn around once more.

Then Lizzie hears a feminine giggle as more vamp speeding is done around her.

Lizzie takes a step further in the building when something grabs her.

"Boo!" The person grabbed her shoulders yelling 'boo' in her ear causing her to jump, frightened.

"Ahhh!" Lizzie screams, dropping her flashlight, then turns around but the person is gone yet she hears another feminine giggle.

"Who are you?" An unidentifiable yet feminine voice asks curiously.

"My… My name is Lizzie." Lizzie stutters out, trying to be confident.

"What are you doing here, Lizzie?" The voice asks again and Lizzie is shaking in fear like a chihuahua.

"I've come for a plant that can only grow here. It's a fleur-de-lis." Lizzie reveals, trying not to tremble in fear while her flashlight spins, trying to find the mystery being before Lizzie crouches down and picks it up.

After she does however, the person scares Lizzie again, causing her to drop it once more.

Unsure of what to do, Lizzie takes out her phone, in order to scroll through her contacts, before looking at MG's number and is about to call it when she gets scared yet again.

"Ahh!" Lizzie screams again, being the person hissed their vamp face at her, but since it's too dark, she couldn't see anything.

However, this act caused her to drop her phone but she didn't realize until she turned around when she heard vamp speeding and steps backwards.

The second Lizzie stepped backwards, she heard the familiar cracking sound, and she gets the look of regret.

"Please tell me that wasn't what I think it was." Lizzie steps forward, turns around, and crouches down to look at her newly cracked phone after she grabs her flashlight.

Lizzie looks pissed at this turn of events as she picks up and pockets her phone before standing up, flailing her light to try to find the being that caused her to break her phone.

But then she hears a rolling sound, so she shines her flashlight down only to see a head at her feet, much to her horror.

"So, you interrupted my lunch because you want a fleur-de-lis flower?" The voice wonders, sounding annoyed.

"Yes, but if you don't have it, then I'll just go." Lizzie answers then starts backing up towards the exit.

"Oh, I have it but I just think that you're making excuses, Lizzie. You don't want a flower, you want me." The voice reveals and although Lizzie is terrified, she gets a look of confusion.

"No I didn't. I strictly came for the flower." Lizzie claims, sounding confused.

The person vamp speeds behind her then turns around, so they're facing each other, but this causes Lizzie to lose her flashlight yet again.

"Well you're not going to get it because you should know my lunch was someone who came here weeks ago and you are the first piece of fresh blood I've come across in that time." The girl explains then vamp speeds her and Lizzie to the bar, slamming Lizzie's back on it.

"Ughh." Lizzie grunts in pain from her back hitting the bar as the female lifts one of her legs to her waist.

"I'm sure you can imagine my hunger. So congratulations Lizzie, you just became my dinner." The girl exclaims happily before letting her fangs fall and biting deeply into Lizzie's neck.

"Ahhh!" Lizzie screams in agony as the vampire feeds on her but then she gets smart and grabs the vampire's hand, her hand starts glowing red, implying that she has started siphoning her.

The vampire stops feeding on her because of this and also because her throat started to burn, making Lizzie smug.

"I never leave home without consuming vervain." Lizzie admits, still smug, as the vampire growls and recollects herself, shocking Lizzie that she didn't go unconscious like most vampires would have.

"Unfortunately for you, I can sustain vervain long enough to kill you." The vampire reveals and Lizzie, realizing that she now has magic, uses telekinesis, throwing the vampire across the room before running to the exit.

The girl recovers quickly from this however, and using vamp speed, she grabs Lizzie by the shoulders, looking absolutely furious.

"You burned my hand. How?" The girl demands.

"Call it my secret ability." Lizzie replies weakly, pissing the girl off more.

"Well let me show you my abilities." She growls through her teeth then the vampire flings her backward into a table, far from the exit, yet close to bloody paw prints.

Lizzie starts crawling towards a paw print as the vampire stalks to her direction then she places her hand on the paw print, and starts to siphon it, as werewolf made it, as well as the fact the power she siphoned from the vampire disappeared after she flung her back with a powerful telekinesis spell.

Lizzie managed to siphon a second paw print before the girl got to her and starts dragging her by her feet, toward the door.

The vampire lifts Lizzie up and slams her against the wall, her vamp face bared.

Lizzie thinks she's going to die until the vampire retracts their fangs but then she abruptly kisses her on the mouth, which Lizzie finds herself reciprocating.

The kiss lasts for a few moments before the girl backs away, gasping for breath, clearly processing something.

"You come from a Boarding School in Virginia." The vampire deduces and Lizzie realizes that the girl got into her head.

"Now, I feel I have to kill you." The vampire believes and before Lizzie can retaliate, the girl pins her arms above her head then proceeds to feed on her.

"Ahh!" Lizzie screams in agony as the vampire feeds on her again and she realizes she doesn't have much time, as the vampire literally admitted that she can sustain vervain as long as it takes to kill her.

Lizzie manages for one of her hands to land on the vampire's wrist, siphoning from her once more, causing the girl to stop yet again.

"You little bitch." The girl grits through her teeth as she holds her wrist, waiting for it to heal.

Once it does, the vampire flings her into another table, causing her head to hit a corner, which makes it bleed.

"Ughh." Lizzie grunts in pain again, as her head slams against a corner of the table she was thrown into.

"I admit, you've got quite the hubris in your heart. Perhaps I'll keep it as a souvenir." The girl suggests before starting to walk closer to Lizzie.

But Lizzie manages to stand up, even with a broken arm, and turns to face the vampire with determination in her eyes.

"You may have the power but so do I and although you have the advantage of immortality, I know something that you don't." Lizzie claims, as she struggles to stand, amusing the vampire.

"And what's that?" The vampire wonders then, before anything else can be done, Lizzie, with her recently gained powers, lifts her non-broken arm and telekinetically breaks the vampire's neck.

"Checkmate you psychotically deranged little bitch. I win." Lizzie exclaims very weak, with 'I win' being the answer to the thing that the vampire didn't know.

After a moment of recollecting herself, Lizzie drags the vampire by one of her feet with her non-broken arm then limps back to her car, cradling her broken arm as she does.

Once she finds the flower she needed, Lizzie drags the vampire's body all the way to her dad's car, siphons some more magic from the unconscious girl then performs a sleep spell before putting her in the vehicle, buckling her in, then gets in the car and drives back to campus.

Lizzie gets back to campus in three hours on the backroads and luckily MG saw her pull up before anyone else could as he runs up to her.

She gets out of the car, where MG catches her, looking appalled and worried about her appearance.

"Are you okay?" MG asks, clearly concerned as he helps her stand up straight.

"Yeah, I'm fine. Can you help me put her in the cellar?" Lizzie wonders weakly as she points to the girl in the car with her non-broken arm.

So MG does just that, putting the girl in the cellar then helps Lizzie back to her dorm via vamp speed, so no one notices her appearance.

When in her room, Lizzie puts her arm back in place, recracking it, then uses magic to heal her bleeding wound that she got from the second table she was thrown into, and also heals the bite wound on her neck, before cloaking the bruise on the other side of her head that she got from the first table she was thrown into.

Happy with her healed and fixed appearance, Lizzie goes to hop in the shower then, when she's done, she changes into her pajamas, and crawls on her bed, utterly exhausted.

Fifteen minutes later, Josie walks into the dorm room, hops in the shower, as she's covered in dirt, changes into her own pajamas, and crawls in the bed next to Lizzie.

"Here you are. I was looking everywhere for you, we must've just missed each other." Josie assumes, confusing Lizzie.

"Hmm?" Lizzie questions, half-asleep and confused.

"I was in the woods around campus looking for you because that's where MG said you were." Josie explains and Lizzie plays the part of lying.

"Oh yeah, we must've just missed each other. I just got back like between twenty to thirty minutes ago." Lizzie claims then Josie snuggles closer to her before they both fall asleep from their respective exhausting days.

A week later, Pedro is walking down the hallway when he reaches the basement door, which he manages to open despite his height.

He walks down the steps, heads to a cooler, and when he reaches it, he drags a stepstool to the cooler in order to open it then grabs a blood bag.

All vampires are only allowed to drink the blood bags in the fridge except one vampire that Pedro is friends with, who is the only one who knows that there's human blood in the basement's cooler, that Pedro closes then starts to walk towards the steps before he hears a noise behind him.

"Who's there?" A very weak yet feminine voice asks causing Pedro to turn around and head to the transitional cellar.

"I'm Pedro. Who are you?" Pedro asks once he reaches the cellar to see a girl sprawled out on the floor grasping the bars, that she uses to help her sit up.

"I'll tell you whatever you want to know. In exchange for that blood bag in your hand." the girl looks desperately at the blood bag, so Pedro pulls out a small plastic cup and pours a small amount of the blood in it then, using a stick, pushes the cup towards her.

"My name is Hope." Hope introduces herself after drinking the blood then places it down for Pedro to refill it.

"Nice to meet you Hope. You know if you're here, that means your detoxing from all the blood that you consume." Pedro informs her and she sighs in annoyance.

"What day is it?" Hope questions, still weak.

"It's sunday. Why?" Pedro wonders curiously after Hope grunts in realization.

"I've been here for a week." Hope realizes with annoyance and anger.

"Who put you here?" Pedro asks, finally refilling the cup with a small amount then pushing to her side in the cellar, which she grabs.

"Some obnoxiously, perky arrogant blonde." Hope answers then drinks the cup before placing it down for it to get refilled.

"It sounds like you're describing my friend Lizzie. Why would she put you down here?" Pedro wonders, pushing the cup back to her after filling it again.

"She came to my city, looking for a flower, then she kidnapped me and brought me here. I don't know why." Hope explains, drinking the blood before she says she doesn't know why, then puts it back down for Pedro to take.

"Where do you come from?" Pedro questions, very curious of her and also intrigued by her as well.

"Genetically; a long line of very dangerous villains. Physically; New Orleans." Hope responds, confusing Pedro.

"That's not right, no one lives in New Orleans except the…" Pedro trails off, realizing who she is.

"Oh my god. You're the NOLA Ghost Creature, who haunts the city and kills anyone who enters." Pedro acknowledges and Hope looks offended.

"The NOLA Ghost Creature? I mean, I guess they're right but it's still mildly offensive." Hope rolls her eyes in annoyance at this nickname.

"Do you harm kids?" Pedro asks, pushing the cup with the last of the blood in it, this question making Hope scoff, very offended by it.

"No, I don't. It's a family rule; we don't harm children. Of course, it depends on the situation for me. Whether it means saving another kid, I'm making a point, or I've reached the ultimate hunger and can't control it, then I kill children." Hope claims, this answer seemingly calming Pedro greatly.

"Well, the blood bag is empty. Minus the blood, I'll come back tomorrow." Pedro assures her then walks back upstairs.


	3. Ratted Out

A month later, Pedro has been visiting Hope for the entirety of that amount of time, unbeknownst to everybody, but one.

Dorian is walking down the hall, where the basement door is then sees Jed, sitting on a couch, reading a book, as the chair he's sitting on is near a bookshelf.

"Jed. Where's Pedro?" Dorian asks, clearly worried causing Jed to look up from his book.

"Pedro is in the basement, Mr. Williams." Jed says casually, yet this answer confuses Dorian.

"Why is he in the basement?" Dorian wonders, voicing his confusion.

"Mr. Williams, Pedro has been going to the basement for the past month. I don't know why though. He might have an imaginary friend, or a pet or something." Jed shares his belief to why Pedro goes to the basement after revealing the truth, shocking Dorian.

"You don't stop him?" Dorian questions, appalled by this answer.

"Umm, everytime he walks out of the basement, he has no injuries of any kind. So, since he isn't hurting himself, or getting hurt in any way, I don't question it. Besides, if he did have any injuries, I'd go to you, the headmaster, or Emma immediately." Jed reassures Dorian, which calms him slightly, but still looks suspicious of Jed.

"Jed, do you go to classes?" Dorian asks, very curious.

"Yeah, I do. Not like you'd know. You always walk down this hallway during lunch and after school, but also I'm always down this hall at those times, so." Jed explains, which makes Dorian more curious of him.

"Jed, do you eat?" Dorina wonders, which confuses Jed.

"Mr. Williams, you come down this hallway during lunch everyday. Mr. Williams, you've seen me eat on multiple occasions." Jed claims, confused by the question, so Dorian realizes that he's right, then walks off to the library to wait for Pedro, leaving Jed to return to reading his book.

A few minutes later, Pedro walks out of the basement and waves at Jed.

"Hi Jed." Pedro greets him and Jed waves back at him.

"Hi Pedro. Heading to the library?" Jed wonders and Pedro nods.

"Yep." Pedro answers verbally even though he already nodded at Jed.

"Have fun." Jed encourages then goes back to reading and Pedro walks into the library, which is emptier than usual but he shrugs it off.

"Hi, Pedro. Can we talk?" Dorian wonders and Pedro nods.

"Sure, Mr. Williams." Pedro agrees and Dorian smiles.

"Look, I know about your adventures to the basement." Dorian gets straight to the point, making Pedro mildly nervous.

"How do you know?" Pedro looks worried.

"That doesn't matter. I want to know why you are going to the basement." Dorian assures Pedro, who gulps nervously.

"I have a friend who stays there." Pedro admits.

"Who is it?" Dorian asks but Pedro starts shifting uncomfortably and continues to look nervous.

"I can't tell you." Pedro claims, still nervous, and Dorian gives him a look.

"It's not my secret to tell you, Mr. Williams." Pedro reveals, mildly intimidated and scared, shocking Dorian.


	4. Abrupt Decisions

"Pedro, it's your friend. Therefore, that makes it your secret." Dorian coaxes Pedro, who gulps before responding.

"You have to promise not to tell anyone. I'll be dead if they find out that I told you." Pedro claims, worrying Dorian.

"Who are they?" Dorian asks, concerned.

"MG and Lizzie." Pedro reveals, continuing to shock Dorian.

"Please promise that you won't tell anyone, Mr. Williams." Pedro pleads desperately.

"I promise." Dorian promises and Pedro relaxes more.

"The friend in the basement is a girl but not just any girl; the NOLA Ghost Creature. Lizzie collected her when she went to New Orleans." Pedro reveals, keeping Dorian shocked.

"When did she go to New Orleans?" Dorian wonders.

"Last month. She left at lunchtime on Monday near the beginning of the month, she was gone for a few hours." Pedro replies.

"How do you know this?" Dorian questions, shocked and confused.

"MG told me that she had to leave so she can get something off campus. Of course, before she talked to MG, I heard an argument in the headmaster's office then Lizzie left it and went to talk to MG." Pedro explains, continuing to shock Dorian then he smiles at him.

"Thank you, Pedro." Dorian leaves for the headmaster's office.

"Come in." Alaric says plainly before taking a bite of an apple after Dorian knocked on the door, so he walks in.

"Hi Dorian. Why do you look like you've seen a ghost?" Alaric looks at Dorian curiously.

"Uh, we have a problem. Now I can't tell you who gave me this information, but I can tell you that for the past month we've had a prisoner in our basement." Dorian gets straight to the point after he closed the door, catching Alaric's attention.

"We've had a prisoner in our basement for a month?" Alaric questions, confused and concerned yet also doesn't seem to believe what Dorian has just told him.

Dorian sits across from him and explains just about everything Pedro told him, managing to not rat out the kid or tell Ric the identity of the prisoner, and Alaric looks shocked and outraged to find out Lizzie is responsible for the prisoner in the basement.

"Get MG and ask him to come to my office. Will you?" Alaric demands causing Dorian to nod and stand up yet before he leaves, Alaric says something else.

"Oh, and can you tell Lizzie that I want to see her." Alaric adds and Dorian nods again, leaving the office in search of MG and Lizzie.

Five minutes later, there's a knock on the door.

"Come in." Alaric says, reading over a piece of paper when Josie walks in.

"Hi dad." Josie greets him but he looks up at her confused.

"I thought I asked Dorian to get Lizzie." Alaric claims, still confused.

"Um, Lizzie's unconscious, so I've come to be her defendant. Also, Emma wanted me to talk to you." Josie admits causing Alaric to sigh in realization.

"Emma sent you to talk me into doing guidance counselling." Alaric correctly assumes as Josie looks at the ground before sitting down across from him, where Dorian was sitting earlier.

"First of all, whatever Lizzie did, I'm absolutely positive she had good intentions." Josie starts, defending Lizzie, before continuing.

"And secondly, I was wondering if I could be your guidance counselor." Josie suggests, shocking Ric as well as catching his attention.

"I mean, the only reason you don't have sessions is because you never have time for Emma. But you always find a way to make time for me and Lizzie." Josie explains and Alaric just sighs, knowing his daughter's right.

"Maybe I can be the school's secondary guidance counselor." Josie recommends enthusiastically.

"You just want to get paid, don't you?" Alaric concludes.

"I really don't see a problem with five bucks an hour. And I can work eight hours throughout the entire week, weekends included. 8x5 is forty. So, forty bucks a week for four years, that's between 58,400 and 73,000 a year. That's plenty of money." Josie shows her math on a notepad she got from his desk, still enthusiastic.

"Why do you need money?" Alaric asks, now very confused.

"Well, I don't expect, or really want, mom to compel me to into college or compel me a car. I need the money for those things, but since I want to go to more than one college, to get several degrees, I need it for college more. So I'll just have to get a new bike since my old one broke." Josie deduces making Alaric happy that Josie's planning for college and realizing she's using his train of thought, the earlier you start saving money, the sooner you're able to pay for college, which makes him even happier.

Before Ric can ask Josie how she broke her bike, there's a knock on the door and Emma walks in.

"Hey. How's it going?" Emma directs this question at Josie, who stood up when she knocked.

"Um, it's going good. Actually, dad agreed to let me be his guidance counselor." Josie reveals, shocking Emma and Alaric, who didn't even agree to this despite her claim.

"Oh, well I guess it makes sense." Emma processes, sounding confused.

Then Josie takes out her phone and starts to type intently before pocketing her phone, which the second she does, Emma's phone buzzes.

Emma takes out her phone, revealing that Josie just texted her, and looks over the text that reads;

_'Don't worry. Me being dad's counselor has an advantage. Every time he talks to me as his guidance counselor, I can repeat it back to you, without him even knowing.'_

Emma re-reads the text from Josie, smiles to herself then pockets her phone.

Just then, Dorian walks in with MG, who looks very confused.

"What's going on, Dr. Saltzman?" MG wonders, clearly confused before he waves to Josie, who waves back.

"I know you are aware of the prisoner in our school's basement." Alaric doesn't even try to sugarcoat this and gets straight to the point, shocking Josie and Emma while making MG nervous.

"We have a prisoner in our basement?" Josie questions, clearly confused and taken aback by this information.

"Yeah, we do." MG dully admits, knowing he can't lie or play dumb in this situation.

"And I'd like for you to get that prisoner and bring them here." Alaric commands and MG just simply nods then walks out to retrieve the prisoner from the basement.


	5. Foolish Ideas

MG walks down the stairs to the basement, holding keys and has something in his jacket.

He walks towards the transitional cellar, his footsteps waking the prisoner.

"What the hell do you want?" Hope asks, bitter and weak.

"You're getting a break from solitude." MG claims, using the keys in his hand to unlock the cell door.

However, the second he unlocked the door, Hope darted for the staircase with her vamp speed but MG, being faster because he's not starving, vamp speeds in front of her a slaps magic-preventing shackles on her.

"What the hell?" Hope growls, furious as she holds her wrists in front of her.

"Yeah, Lizzie told me all about sensing the fact that you can practice magic, this is just insurance." MG claims but Hope scoffs.

"I don't need magic to kill you. Especially when you just provided a weapon for me." Hope exclaims, shoving her shackles in his face but MG rolls his eyes, grabs the chain connecting the cuffs, and starts leading, well more of dragging her up the stairs.

"Come on, miss moody-pants. You're in luck, the headmaster wants to see you now." MG reveals then walks her all the way to Alaric's office, which luckily isn't far.

MG walks into the office after knocking on the door, dragging the prisoner in.

"You can leave, MG." Alaric demands and MG is about to walk out when the prisoner speaks.

"Wait. You're going to leave me, a weak and starving vampire, in a room with a delicious looking, four-course meal?" Hope wonders with a weak tone of voice then smiles to herself happily.

"Then, by all means, do leave." Hope encourages, which makes MG nervous but Ric nods at him to do so, something that he reluctantly does.

However, when he does leave, she makes no actual move to feed on any of them, instead she just sits down where Josie was previously.

"So, you're the headmaster." Hope concludes boredly, then leans forward and picks up his name plaque, that's at the front of his desk.

"Alaric Saltzman. Why does that name sound so familiar?" Hope murmurs to herself after reading his name aloud.

Hope thinks about this for a moment then, with her mind coming up empty, puts the plaque back on the desk and looks around until Josie catches her eye.

"Who are you?" Hope smiles charmingly at her, which makes Josie slightly blush.

"I'm Josie." Josie introduces herself, her name seemingly making Hope smile more broadly at her before frowning in realization.

"I can sense you. You're a witch yet you aren't, just like Lizzie." Hope reveals, shocking Josie.

"You know Lizzie?" Josie asks and Hope nods at her.

"I do. She came to my city and then took me from it, almost immediately after she said she wasn't there for me." Hope explains, shocking everyone else in the room.

"Your city?" Dorian looks and sounds confused causing Hope to roll her eyes.

"Yeah, my city. I'm from New Orleans." Hope admits, this answer seeming to infuriate Ric.

"Oh my god. You're the New Orleans Siren." Josie realizes in shock and horror, as Hope turns her body towards Josie's direction, clearly liking her.

"Ooh, I like that nickname. It's better than the NOLA Ghost Creature." Hope shares her belief but now Josie is confused.

"How do you not know your own nicknames?" Josie wonders curiously.

"I focus on killing people, not rumors that the living make up." Hope replies, yet since she's clearly liking Josie, she decides to Q&A with her.

"What other nicknames do I have?" Hope looks curious of and clearly intrigued by Josie, who mildly blushes from the attention being on her.

"That isn't entirely relevant." Alaric interrupts, causing Hope to turn her head and glare at him.

"I was talking to her. I don't recall inviting you to this conversation." Hope retorts bitterly then turns back to face Josie, smiling at her once more.

"We can talk later." Josie assures Hope with a shy smile after receiving a stern look from her father.

"Lizzie went to New Orleans to get you?" Alaric is trying not to sound angry while saying this yet it sounds like he's growling through his teeth.

"Yep. Oh my god." Hope comes to a realization after agreeing to Ric's question then scoffs in a disgusted manner.

"You know I've seen a lot of these, each one very disturbing. Yet this one has to be the worst one I have come across." Hope states vaguely making everyone else in the room curious and confused.

"What are you talking about?" Emma asks softly but Hope just scoffs again.

"You are a school for the supernatural under the guise of a school for troubled rich kids. But I know what you really are; an undercover science facility." Hope reveals her belief, shocking them all but before anyone can say anything, she continues.

"I didn't see it before but seeing you command these people to do what you want. The students don't practice their abilities because they want to or for fun, it's because they'll get tested on if they don't. And you sit here, head of it all, letting it happen. Ohh, I'm sure you'll love me, seeing as how I'm a tribrid." Hope rants then reveals her species.

"A tribrid?" Josie questions in a quiet tone as she looks at her, confused.

"Yeah, a tribrid. I'm all three species. I've got some wolf, I've got some witch, and I've got some vampire, all species coming from my dad's side of course. Well, both my parents were wolves so, species wise, I only get the one from my mother." Hope murmurs to herself after revealing what she is.

"But, regardless, the worst part is that you use kids as part of your experiments, like adorable little Pedro, who I can only assume ratted me out as your prisoner. And then there's you." Hope turns to Emma, looking sympathetically at her.

"You're being tested on too. As well as probably observing behavior. I've been to plenty of these before. You have someone bring in a new species, you keep them in a cell, then interrogate them. Once that's done, you throw them back in the cell, after drugging them, and give them nice people, whether observers or not, so they can make friends. And when that's all said and done, the person the prisoner befriended, or someone else starts the torturing and experimenting processes." Hope explains the supernatural science facilities that she's been to with an angry tone then relaxes herself before talking again.

"So, who's going to offer me a spiked drink? If it makes you feel better, I'll pretend to be clueless." Hope claims then looks around expectantly, as though the headmaster, Emma, or Dorian are going to hand her a drink.

All four of them are in so much shock by this girl's assumptions, it takes a while for them to recollect themselves and speak.

The only reason Alaric wasn't speaking was because he just became so fixated on the prisoner's eyes, to the point where it made her visibly uncomfortable.

"I'm sorry. It's just, I swear I've seen you eyes before." Alaric admits after apologizing.

"They're blue. I'm sure you've seen them in a mirror, or if you ever look at Lizzie." Hope tells him the possibilities but he shakes his head.

"No, not your eyes. They look like someone I used to know. It's like they copied his eyes and pasted them onto you." Alaric explains and he looks like he might go insane trying to figure out the prisoner's eye color and where he's seen them before.

"Well, a lot of the people I cross paths with, before I kill them, say I have my father's eyes." Hope reveals, making Ric more curious.

"Who are you?" Alaric asks sternly and Hope looks touched by this question, though for unknown reasons.

"Oh, it appears I haven't introduced myself. Hope Mikaelson." Hope introduces herself shocking Alaric.

"Your father being…" Alaric starts but Hope just cuts him off.

"Klaus Mikaelson." Hope answers plainly, shocking the rest of the room.

"I knew him. Your mother's name was Hayley Marshall wasn't it?" Alaric questions and Hope nods.

"I knew both of your parents. I heard Klaus was going to be a parent years ago, but I just thought that he had lost the child." Alaric reveals what he believed.

"Your parents have been off the grid for the past two years." Alaric remembers then decides to ask something.

"Have you been in contact with them?" Alaric wonders curiously, but Hope scoffs at this question.

"Nope. I haven't found down time to purchase a ouija board yet." Hope states plainly, continuing to shock the room.

"They're dead?" Alaric looks horrified by this revelation.

"Yep, I mean come on, no one has seen, or heard from either of them in two years and no matter how good you are at staying off the grid, somebody, somewhere, would see you once. Therefore, two+two equals dead." Hope retorts but Josie speaks up.

"Actually, it equals four." Josie pipes up and then goes back to shyly looking at ground when they all look in her direction.

"But that's not the point." Josie says with a defeated tone, tucking a lock of hair behind her ear.

After that, Alaric explained to Hope that they weren't a science facility, but Hope wasn't buying it and brought up the fact that they're all wearing uniforms, which does help her case, unfortunately but she seemed to believe they actually were a school, only after Josie explained to her what was going on.

"Alright, back to solitary for you." Alaric reveals yet Hope seems pleased to go back.

"Bring him in." Alaric presses a button under his desk and speaks into it.

A moment later, the door opened.

"You called." A familiar voice came from behind Hope, causing her to turn around.

"Hope, this is Landon. Landon, this is Hope." Alaric introduces them to each other.

"I feel like I've seen you before but I can't remember where." Hope admits, looking at Landon curiously.

"Sorry, but I've never seen you before in my life." Landon claims, looking apologetic.

"Landon, can you take Hope back to the cellar?" Alaric asks, and Landon starts immediately nodding.

"Uh, yeah. Absolutely." Landon agrees then walks halfway, before Hope stands up and starts to walk towards him but accidentally bumps into Josie, who was about to leave the office as well, yet this accidental collision caused Josie to drop what was in her hands to fall out.

"Oh, my bad. Excuse me." Hope apologizes for bumping into Josie, who just smiles and nods it off like wasn't a big deal.

Landon leads Hope out of the office, holding her forearm instead of the chain, and walks down the hall before Hope gets confused.

"Um, this doesn't seem right. I think the cellar is back that way." Hope motions behind her and Landon looks to where she's pointing, shrugs, then turns around to walk that way.

"Well, you would know." Landon claims as they walk in the direction Hope remembers.

"You have no idea where the cellar is, do you?" Hope concludes after they walked around practically the entire school.

"No I don't. I've only been here for nearly two months now. I didn't even know this place had a cellar to be honest." Landon admits while he looks around, trying to see if there's a door he missed.

"Well, maybe the entrance is outside. You know, like how some houses have a door that leads to the basement on the outside of them." Hope suggests and Landon starts to nod.

"Yeah, maybe this school has one." Landon seems to agree with Hope's suggestion and walks outside with her, still holding her forearm.

After they walk around the grounds, Hope starts to laugh darkly.

"You know Landon. I know two things that you don't." Hope states cryptically, catching his attention.

"One, you are the most gullible person I ever met. And two…" Hope trails off, to make sure no one's watching, then rips her arm out of his grasp, vamp speeds him to the wall, slamming him against it very hard before continuing.

"I am very hungry." Hope lets her veins and yellow eyes appear, her fangs fall, then feeds on him, biting deeply into his neck, not tasting anything revolting.

Landon struggles for a bit before Hope stops feeding on him, sighs pleasurably at the taste of his blood, then vamp speeds him off campus, taking him as a hostage.


	6. A Hostage Situation

Hope vamp speeds Landon to a secluded part of the woods, off campus.

"You didn't kill me." Landon points out as he gets weak from the blood loss.

"Believe it or not, I don't want you dead." Hope reveals, shocking Landon.

"Now that you have me as a hostage and your personal bloodbag, how are you going to remove those shackles?" Landon asks, getting weaker as a result of his bleeding injury.

Meanwhile, Josie bends over and starts picking up her books from Hope bumping into her when there's a knock on the door then Lizzie walks in shyly.

"Hi." Lizzie greets the people in the room nervously, as it's obvious her dad is very angry, but Lizzie starts focusing on Josie, looking at her curiously.

"Josie. Where's your bobby pin?" Lizzie wonders but Josie rolls her eyes.

"What do you mean? I have all of them in my hair." Josie claims yet Lizzie scoffs at this.

"No, you don't. I put five in your hair, you only have four." Lizzie points out, shocking Josie, who just stood up from collecting her things on the floor.

"No, that's not possible. I could've sworn I had…" Josie trails off after touching her hair then realizes something.

**(Flashback)**

Hope stands up, to make her way to Landon but accidentally bumps into Josie, knocking the things out of her hands.

"Oh, my bad. Excuse me." Hope apologizes, sliding her hand through Josie's hair, taking a bobby pin from it.

Josie just smiles, nodding it off, before Hope walks over to Landon and they leave.

**(End of flashback)**

"She took a bobby pin from my hair." Josie realizes, confusing Lizzie.

"Who?" Lizzie asks, voicing her confusion.

"Hope. The prisoner from the cellar." Josie clarifies, making Lizzie shocked and wanting to ask how they know about that, but before she can, Kaleb walks in after knocking on the door slightly.

"Um guys, we might have a problem that you need to see." Kaleb admits causing the five of them to follow him out to the garden.

"Some of the younger class discovered this and came to me immediately." Kaleb points out the footprints on the ground then to the wall, where they can make out something red.

"What happened?" Emma questions, looking and sounding concerned.

"Best bet? A girl was walking with someone from campus, they go against wall, someone injures the other and then leaves without a trace." Kaleb assumes and Josie gets confused.

"What do you mean by someone injuring another?" Josie asks, speaking up on her confusion.

"Well that red spot on the wall right there? It's blood. My best guess is that it came from the student." Kaleb reveals, pointing to the red on the wall, horrified that it might've come from the student.

"Why do you assume a student was here?" Alaric wonders, looking around at the scene.

"The footprints, Dr. S. These footprints were made from a feminine type boot but these were made by school shoes." Kaleb explains, motioning to the different shoe prints.

"I've seen these boot prints before." Lizzie admits, as she examines them.

"These are Hope's shoes." Lizzie concludes.

"Who's Hope?" MG asks, walking up.

"The prisoner we have in our basement." Alaric replies bitterly as he glares at Lizzie, who looks at the ground ashamed.

"We have a prisoner in our basement?" Penelope jogs up, seemingly concerned by the scene in the garden.

"We had a prisoner in the basement." Josie corrects her, making 'have' past tense and pointing to the footprints that match the shoes of the prisoner.

"No, this doesn't make any sense. We sent Landon to put her in the cellar." Emma reveals, disbelieving that the prisoner escaped, but Lizzie bursts out laughing.

"Oh, Oh, I - I'm sorry. You put a student, who has been here for a little over a month, in charge of putting a very dangerous vampire in a cell that he doesn't even know the location of?" Lizzie questions, laughing as she does, clearly finding them hilarious, before recollecting herself and getting more serious yet this makes them realize that they should've had someone else do it.

"We should let the school know, so they can defend themselves and know to stay inside." Emma advises and Alaric nods in agreement.

All of the students are in the main hall, waiting for the headmaster to speak.

"For the past month, we have had a prisoner on our grounds and in our basement." Alaric announces, some people start whispering.

In the woods, Hope has just shown Landon the bobby pin that she took.

"Today, the prisoner has escaped, aided by a student who she has taken hostage." Alaric continues his announcement while the scene still focuses on the woods.

Hope picks the lock on her shackles, then drops the bobby pin as she lets the shackles fall from her wrists.

"The student that she took is Landon Kirby. I'm telling all of you this so that you can stay inside yet defend yourself if this girl comes back here. Thank you." Alaric finishes his speech and dismisses the students, who walk back to their dorms, still muttering to themselves.

"Emma, why don't you stay here with the younger kids?" Alaric suggests and Emma nods in agreement to these terms.

Dorian already knows that Ric wants him staying there to further secure the school, as he just nods at Alaric without him having to say a word, which Alaric appreciates.


	7. Prying Eyes

Alaric is about to scold Lizzie for her actions after Emma and Dorian walk away but he is interrupted by his phone ringing.

Alaric takes his phone from his pocket, to scan the person who's calling, only to answer immediately when he sees that it's the sheriff.

"Sheriff Donovan. What's with the call?" Alaric asks concerned, as the students who were investigating the remnants of Landon being taken stand before him, looking worried.

"We have a problem. How fast can you get to Mystic Falls High School?" Matt wonders.

"I'll be there as soon as I can." Alaric hangs up the phone after saying this then starts to walk away when the other students start to follow.

"What are all of you doing?" Alaric questions, turning around when he heard footsteps following him.

"Helping you. It would probably be better with several supernatural beings on your side." Kaleb recommends, making Alaric feel touched by this, only to notice Lizzie way ahead of the group.

"Where are you going?" Alaric's stern voice causes Lizzie to stop in her tracks and turn around.

"I'm going to go look for Hope." Lizzie responds, confidently.

"No, your not." Josie intercepts with what Alaric was going to say.

"Yes, I am! Look, I'm the reason that Hope was here in the first place, which makes me responsible for Landon being a hostage! So, I'm going to go find her and try to clean up the mess that I created!" Lizzie shouts at them with tears forming in her eyes, shocking Kaleb and Penelope with this information.

"It's bad enough that dad hates me for breaking a promise I made to him! So if there's a chance to save Landon and fix my mess, I'll do it. Even if it means finding her." Lizzie has tears streaming down her face, very upset, then storms off to go look for Hope before anyone can stop her from leaving, yet this leaves Alaric feeling guilty, along with Josie.

Josie runs after her, eventually heading to their dorm room where Lizzie is preparing to do a spell.

"What are you doing?" Josie wonders curiously, yet looks at her twin with sympathy.

"A locator spell. See this?" Lizzie holds up a glass bear-looking figure.

"What is it?" Josie approaches the map and her sister cautiously.

"A talisman representing Hope's magic. I created it after I put her in the cell a month ago. I can always track her, so even if she's cloaked herself, I'll find her with a simple locator spell." Lizzie reveals as she places the talisman on the map in order to wipe some tears from her eyes.

"You know dad doesn't hate you. He's just angry with you right now." Josie assures Lizzie, but she just rolls her eyes.

"Are you talking to me as dad's defendant, because I don't want, or need that right now. So, if you want to help me track Hope, then help me but if not, then the door is right behind you." Lizzie claims angrily, before starting to do a locator spell after siphoning magic from the school.

Nothing happens on or to the map, instead Lizzie just looks like she's being possessed by something while she chants the locator spell, making Josie concerned.

Once the spell's done, Lizzie looks at Josie with a small smile that she doesn't return.

"I found her. She's in the woods, with Landon, and she's still in Mystic Falls." Lizzie reveals happily causing Josie to smile at her.

In that moment, Alaric walks into the dorm room, surprised to see Josie there.

"I'll let you two talk." Josie excuses herself and scurries out of the room.

"I'm sorry I broke my promise to you. I just needed one last ingredient in order to make a special meal because you said that mom would be returning and I knew that the special ingredient I needed didn't grow anywhere else." Lizzie explains, upset as another tear tear starts to roll down her cheek.

"But I found her, so I can make this right." Lizzie admits, picking up the talisman she created that represents Hope's magic.

"As long as I have this, I'll always be able to track her magic as well as her and Landon." Lizzie exclaims, not knowing that the talisman has downsides.

"Alright. How about we see why the sheriff wants us at the high school?" Alaric suggests, then him and Lizzie walk out, having made amends.

So, Alaric, Lizzie, Josie, Penelope, Kaleb, and MG head to Mystic Falls High, only to be horrified by the fact that they're at a crime scene on the school grounds.

"Morning sheriff." Alaric greets him, yet the sheriff looks grim.

"Alaric. I didn't know you were bringing companions. This isn't really something for the eyes of minors." Matt explains, then leads them to the actual crime scene, where there is a blonde sitting against a tree, with a completely mutilated body, in an untouched cheer uniform.

MG holds back throwing up at the body before him, while everyone else looks away, utterly disturbed.

"I don't know what the hell this is or how to explain it." Matt reveals, also disturbed by the body.

A brunette in a cheer uniform, with a scarf around her neck, is sitting at an ambulance, looking absolutely confused, this girl catching Lizzie's attention.

"Josie." Lizzie mutters, nudging her with an elbow then nods to the girl's direction, causing Josie to nod understandingly, and they leave the scene to talk to her.

Alaric decides to explain to Matt all about Hope, well what he knows, and the danger she is.

"Do you think she's behind this?" Matt asks, motioning to the body.

"I don't know, but it's best not to rule anything out." Alaric claims causing Matt to nod and Alaric turns around, immediately noticing that his kids aren't there.

"Where are Lizzie and Josie?" Alaric questions, looking worried.

"They went to talk to the brunette in the ambulance." Penelope responds, pointing to where they went, easing Ric's nerves.

At the ambulance, Lizzie and Josie are interrogating the girl, who's very confused.

"So, what is the last thing that you remember?" Lizzie wonders, sounding mildly impatient.

"Me and my friend were walking off campus to head home, when this gorgeous girl approached us and then took my friend to the stoner den. Where is my friend anyway, she's been gone for a while." The girl claims curiously, looking between them as they look at each other, not knowing how to answer that.

"Um, was your friend wearing a cheer uniform before this gorgeous girl showed up?" Josie continued to interrogate her, both her and Lizzie agreeing to ignore the question.

"No, she was in her gym uniform. Why? Is she okay?" the girl sounds worried now while Lizzie and Josie look at each other, trying not to freak out.

"Um, listen…" Lizzie starts then looks to the girl for a name.

"Jane." Lizzie smiles at her then grabs the sides of her head.

"Your friend Brianne, got a call she needed to take and realized that she comes from a very rich and royal family, so she went home to pack because her presence was requested immediately by those recently discovered relatives. Rest assured, she won't be back for a while. Do you understand?" Lizzie asks the girl, who looks like she's in a hypnotic state.

"I understand." Jane repeats in her hypnotic trance then snaps out of it when Lizzie removes her hands from the sides of her face.

Afterwards, Lizzie and Josie continue to interrogate Jane, without being bothered by her frantic behavior.

Once they get all the information they can, Lizzie and Josie walk away, with Josie looking at Lizzie curiously.

"What did you do to her?" Josie wonders curiously.

"What do you mean?" Lizzie plays dumb but Josie doesn't fall for it.

"You know what I mean." Josie pushes Lizzie to talk.

"It was a simple compulsion spell that works regardless of being on vervain." Lizzie explains, shocking Josie, who doesn't even know that was spell, let alone how to do it.

The two head back to the crime scene, then inform Matt that they already interrogated the girl with the scarf, as well as alluded to the compulsion spell.

After he processes this information, he gets a phone call from a different town sheriff.

"Hello. What? No, don't touch anything. I'll be there with back-up." Matt assures the person on the other end then hangs up.

"What was that all about sheriff?" MG is the first to ask this question, even though others wanted to.

"There's been another crime scene a town over. The body completely mutilated." Matt reveals, both shocking and horrifying the students, as well as Alaric with this information.


	8. Wild Goose Chase

The team heads to the second crime scene in the next town over.

"Sheriff Donovan." the sheriff who called greets him as they shake hands.

"Where's the victim?" Matt asks and the sheriff simply leads them to the scene, this being different than the other crime scene at the school.

"Brunette male, business man. Was on his way home to his wife." the sheriff explains, looking sadly at the man.

"I heard that there was a mutilated body in your town." the sheriff reveals, looking at Matt who nods.

"There was. But the victim was a blonde, female, high school student and this is a married, brunette, businessman." Matt claims as he looks at the body confused.

"What's significant about a high school student and a businessman to this person?" Alaric wonders aloud, probably to just put the question out there as he knows that nobody has the answer.

"They changed genders, hair color, locations…" Penelope starts naming the differences about the crime scenes but Lizzie interrupts her.

"They didn't change locations. Both bodies have been found in the woods not far from, well actually pretty close to civilization, so there's significance to the outdoors being near a town to this person." Lizzie deduces, motioning to the building that is in sight distance of the crime scene.

"Does that building have cameras?" Josie wonders, pointing to the building that Lizzie just motioned to.

"Yeah, it does. Why?" the sheriff questions, confused.

"Well, if this person cares about the significance that my sister pointed out, then they wouldn't know, or care, that cameras are on them. So, there's a possibility that those cameras caught something of importance." Josie clarifies the importance of the cameras and the team head to the nearby building to look at the what security cameras caught.

The team are standing around the desk, as the sheriff pulls up the footage of earlier.

In the footage, see the currently deceased male walking away from the building when they see a guy sitting by a tree, the video footage clearly depicting Landon, who is holding his neck as though he's injured.

"That's Landon." MG points out, then they see the man run up to Landon and starts to check on him.

"Sir, are you okay?" the businessman asks, looking over the injury.

"I'm fine. Just got a little winded, and needed to sit down." Landon claims but the man doesn't believe him.

"But sir, you're bleeding." the man motions to his neck, continuing to look him over, when a girl shows up.

"Oh, like you care." the girl says, the three Saltzman's recognizing the voice immediately.

"That's Hope." Lizzie reveals, and they continue to watch the footage intently.

"I do care." the man stands up to face Hope.

"No, you don't. You're lying." Hope claims, approaching the guy threateningly.

"I'm not. What are you doing?" the man asks, terrified after Landon jumps up and puts him in an arm lock.

"Well, I'm starving and I have a thing about liars. So you just became lunch." Hope bites the guys neck as Landon looks away, clearly not pleased by his role in this, before letting him go.

Hope takes him and throws him behind the tree they found his body at, then Landon looks over at him as his companion vamp speeds to the camera.

"Well, what a peculiar place for technology. Unfortunately, this isn't going to be child friendly. Night, night." Hope blows a kiss into the camera before turning off the camera, leaving the room shocked by the events.

"She knew that the camera was there." MG states, numbly.

"Can you rewind the footage? I thought I saw something." Josie requests and the sheriff does just that.

Josie looks at her notepad, then back at the footage, and finds herself smiling.

"I knew it." Josie exclaims, still smiling, making the room curious.

"Knew what?" Penelope wonders, looking at the footage, trying to see what Josie does.

"They're being dressed post-mortem." Josie reveals, but everyone looks confused.

"What?" the sheriff looks closer at the footage, only to realize that she's right.

"When me and Lizzie interrogated the brunette in the ambulance at the previous crime scene, she said her friend was wearing her gym uniform, not a cheerleading one which makes sense, since the girl also said that her friend wasn't even in cheerleading." Josie explains, looking at her notepad.

"Wait. If the previous victim wasn't a cheerleader, why put her in a cheer uniform?" MG wonders aloud, which makes them contemplate this until the second sheriff's phone rings.

"Hello? What, when? No, I'll be there shortly. Don't touch anything." the sheriff hangs up the phone, shaking his head.

"We've got another crime scene. Not far from the border of this town." the sheriff reveals, shocking everyone.

"This is escalating into a spree." Penelope points out, shaking her head and they all leave to go to the third crime scene.

"Not in a cheer uniform, but same victim as the first. Blonde haired female, completely mauled and mutilated." Matt claims, looking at the victim disapprovingly of the state she's in.

"I'm going to go talk to her." Lizzie announces, looking at a female brunette with a scarf around her neck, so her and Josie leave to interrogate this girl.

Lizzie interrogates the girl while Josie takes notes yet after receiving a look from her twin, she takes out a clipboard from her bag and writes on it then gives Lizzie a thumbs up along with a smile and a small nod.

"Guys. I just had a bad thought." MG says cryptically, once Lizzie and Josie come back, catching everyone's attention.

"What is it?" Kaleb wonders, looking at MG.

"What if we're looking at this wrong? What if these aren't Hope's victims? What if they're actually Landon's?" MG looks curious at the mutilated blonde female.

"He makes a point. I mean, before Landon came to our school he went to Mystic Falls High, where our first victim was and he was tormented relentlessly while being there." Penelope agrees with MG, bringing up Landon's past.

"So, you're saying that these people are surrogates for Landon's bullies?" Kaleb deduces questioningly and MG nods in agreement.

"Wait, if that's the case, then what you're saying is that Landon is taking advantage of Hope's abilities by having her kill surrogates for his tormentors." Alaric shakes his head in disbelief.

"Well it's that, or the other bad thought I just got." MG claims, and everyone looks at him expectantly.

"What's this one?" Penelope questions, curiously.

"These actually are Hope's choices of victims and she's having Landon kill them for her." MG reveals but this makes less sense than the first theory.

"Guys, there's one question that we haven't asked ourselves yet." Lizzie just randomly blurts out, having everyone look at her.

"Ok, now what's this one?" Kaleb asks, sounding impatient.

"Why the hell did she take Landon in the first place?" Lizzie wonders aloud causing all of them to think about this intently as they stand at the crime scene, all seemingly worried about this question.


	9. Good Questions with No Answers

They are all thinking about Lizzie's question when Penelope comes to a conclusion.

"Well, like you said before we got called to the first crime scene, Landon has only been here for less than two months and everyone on campus knows that non-vampires who are at the school for three months are supposed to take vervain." Penelope points out.

"So, she took him to have a personal bloodbag?" MG looks confused but Penelope just nods in agreement.

"Ok. But why not kill him? It's obvious with the escalating murders, that she's feeding on her victims, that clearly don't take long for her to find." Kaleb makes a very good point, then Josie realizes something.

"I'm assuming it has something to do with whatever Pedro told her." Josie assumes and Lizzie looks horrified at the mention of Pedro.

"What?" Lizzie continues to gape at Josie, still horrified that she mentioned Pedro.

"When she was in dad's office, she mentioned him, which means he must've discovered her while going exploring in the basement." Josie claims, not easing Lizzie's nerves at all.

"So, whatever Hope knows, she might have possibly learned from Pedro." MG concludes.

"She did. I just texted Dorian and he told me all about Pedro being the one who told him about the prisoner in the basement." Alaric pipes in on the conversation, showing them his phone, yet Lizzie's nerves are still far from calm.

"Oh great. She could know anything. That's the problem with Pedro, everyone trusts him with various information so her knowledge can be more extensive than ever." Penelope scoffs and rolls her eyes, this comment making everyone worried and Lizzie more anxious.

In the woods, Hope continues to drag Landon around as his neck profusely bleeds, as she hasn't been healing him since she started feeding on him.

"I don't know what you want from me, but you said you didn't want me dead. If you were lying, then leave me here to bleed out but if you weren't, then I'm not being much help in my current predicament." Landon proclaims very weak from the profusely bleeding neck wound he tries to hold close with his one hand.

Hope sighs in exasperation, yet knowing that he's right, as she decides to turn and face him as he places his bloody hand on a tree then covers his wound with his other hand.

"I mean, on second thought, why don't you kill me?" Landon asks, curiously yet still very weak.

"You're important for what I plan to do. Here." Hope explains then bites into her wrist and puts near Landon's face.

He looks weary of it but she nods, motioning to her wrist, so he grabs it and bites deeply into it causing Hope to gasp in pleasure rather than pain.

Landon doesn't take much of her blood before stopping, but this is most likely because he felt uncomfortable feeding off of her.

"You didn't take that much." Hope points out, looking shocked by this as Landon sighs in relief, feeling his wound heal.

"Well, I just figured the more blood that I took from you, the higher the chances you'd have at returning the favor, ten-fold." Landon admits, causing Hope to roll her eyes, realizing that he's all about self-preservation.

"Why did you take me hostage?" Landon changes the subject, his voice sounding genuine and soft.

"Because according to Pedro, you are the only student who has vervain-free blood." Hope reveals with a roll of her eyes, shocking Landon that she's been in contact with Pedro.

"Look, we're wasting time. Let's go, I want to be far away from here." Hope grabs Landon's forearm and drags him along on whatever journey she needs him for.

Back with the group, they're all still trying to figure out why Hope took Landon in the first place, outside of the fact he has vervain-free blood, when MG picks something up.

"I smell blood." MG just states abruptly, causing everyone to look around most eyes looking in the twins direction.

"Oh come on. Why does everybody look at me when they ask that?" Lizzie pouts, crossing her arms embarrassed, when Kaleb smells it too.

"I smell it too. Don't worry Lizzie, it's not you. That has an entirely different smell." Kaleb reassures Lizzie, who now looks curious as she uncrosses her arms.

"Then, what kind of blood are you smelling?" Lizzie looks confused as she continues to pout.

"I don't know, but it's coming from this direction." MG points then starts walking away, meaning that it isn't from the body, or has anything to do with it.

So the group follows both MG and Kaleb until they reach the wooded area Hope and Landon were just at, unbeknownst to them.

"Here. The blood's in this area somewhere." MG claims, starting to look around then looks at Josie, who stares at a tree in horror.

"I think this is what you're smelling." Josie continues to gape in horror at the tree that has a bloody handprint on it, then backs up when Kaleb and MG come to investigate.

"That's the same scent of the blood that was on the school building." Kaleb realizes after briefly sniffing the tree.

"Meaning that…" Lizzie starts when MG realizes it.

"This is Landon's blood. The scent wasn't here for just about the entire time we were investigating the crime scene, which means that we just missed them." MG points out in revelation and horror, but this just pisses them off.

"Is it safe to assume that Landon purposefully did this? If so, do you think he's going to help us track him by making a trail of his blood on different trees?" Josie looks hopeful that both these answers are a yes.

"Well, if this bloody handprint was left here by Landon on purpose, that means he knew we were nearby." Penelope concludes.

"If that's the case, then he was probably praying that we would pick up the scent faster." Kaleb adds to Penelope's case, when the cop's, who called them there, phone starts to ring.

He answers it only to say the same things that Matt and the second sheriff had said previously.

"There has been another crime scene in a different town." the cop reveals.

"I wonder what the victim looks like this time." Penelope rolls her eyes making it obvious that she's more annoyed with this murder spree Hope's on than anything and they all leave to head to the fourth crime scene.

They reach the fourth crime scene, to reveal that it's a male victim, similar to the second one and even dressed in a fresh undamaged suit.

"I'm confused by several things." Josie states out of the blue as she looks at this male victim, catching everyone's attention since they all look at her expectantly.

"One; why is she mutilating the bodies? Two; why is she dressing them in clean clothes? Three; why is she choosing wooded areas close to civilization? And four; why is she differentiating between brunette males and blonde females?" Josie asks the first four questions on her mind that are confusing her greatly, causing everyone to think about each one.

"But everytime there's a blonde female victim, there's always a brunette wearing a scarf nearby, being interrogated yet the males are just the victims. There are no witnesses or people in a scarf." Lizzie points out, which confuses everyone more as some of them scratch their heads because of it.

"Well, if there's one thing that I do know, it's that we have way too many questions and not enough sleep in order to process it all." MG realizes causing them all to either laugh or chuckle at this.

"Yeah, well unfortunately there's no rest for the wicked. Another crime scene has just been reported." the sheriff comes up, holding up his phone before them causing the group to sigh in exhaustion and exasperation.


	10. Gambling with Life

"This is getting insane." Lizzie sighs out loudly in annoyance then she places her head on Josie's shoulder.

"No rest for the wicked, indeed." Penelope murmurs under her breath, also annoyed by these turn of events.

So the team goes to the fifth crime scene, which reveals that the victim is another blonde in fresh clothes, which is covering her bloody and mutilated body.

"Alright, every victim had a wallet on them. I'm going to call Dorian, to see if he can get background checks on these people. I mean, they were targeted for a reason outside of looks. Maybe he can figure out what." Alaric claims then takes out his phone to call Dorian as he walks away from the scene, also holding the girl's wallet.

"Okay, let's do some investigating." MG encourages and they all nod at him.

"Uh guys. Is it just me or does this look familiar?" Josie asks as she looks at the body curiously.

"It looks like every other crime scene. Why, what are you seeing that we aren't?" Matt wonders as he also looks at the victim curiously.

"Exactly. The wooded area near civilization, the redressing, having them leaning against a tree…" Josie trails off, clearly figuring something out.

"She's posing them." Josie states in realization, confusing them and Alaric walks up, looking confused as well.

"So, I called Dorian and he said he'll call back when he gets something. What did I miss?" Alaric questions, looking around at all of them knowing that he missed something.

"Hope is posing the victims." Josie says again, confusing Alaric.

"What do you mean she's posing them?" MG looks the most confused but that's not saying much.

"It makes sense. She kills them, places them up against a tree, then mutilates them in frustration and anger." Josie explains but this just confuses them more.

"Ok, let's say you're right. What is she so angry and frustrated about?" Matt asks, still confused yet willing to believe Josie's case.

"Them. Everytime she poses them against a tree, she's looking for clarity of mind, or something. But when she doesn't get it, she completely mutilates them, then places them in fresh clothes of her choosing, moving on from the scene in order to get it right. Or at least, that's what she's doing with the men." Josie realizes but Lizzie's still confused.

"What's so significant about the men? I mean, I would say it's for sexist reasons but she's killing women too." Lizzie voices her confusion.

"Maybe the men are surrogates for somebody that she hates and she just can't entirely place who?" Penelope suggests and Josie nods at her in agreement while Lizzie walks over to talk to the brunette in a scarf that's standing around looking dazed and confused.

"Hi. Can we talk?" Lizzie smiles at the girl, who smiles back at her.

"Sure." the girl agrees and Lizzie starts to interrogate her.

"Oh, I was supposed to be meeting up with my family's campground when I heard horrible screams coming from that direction." the girl points to where the cops are.

"Your family has a campground. Where is it?" Lizzie wonders curiously.

"Right over that hill then like two miles straight." the girl gives Lizzie the directions, pointing to the hill and Lizzie smiles at her.

"Thank you." Lizzie walks away and Josie watches her curiously as she starts slowly walking towards her, only to be stopped by her dad's phone going off.

"Hello?" Alaric answers the phone.

"Hey Ric, I did background checks on the names you gave me. Now the men check out, all married, all had 9-to-5 jobs, just all around normal lives." Dorian tells him, making Ric curious as the students all look at him, mildly worried.

"What about the women?" Alaric asks, and he can hear Dorian sigh, as though he's not sure.

"Uh, that's the thing. All the female victims are fake. They have fake names, just fake everything. Something interesting is that all of the female victims families either come from science backgrounds or are scientists, now does that mean anything to you?" Dorian questions curiously and Alaric thinks about this for a moment before responding.

"No, it doesn't. Thanks Dorian." Ric hangs up the phone, processing this information.

"What did Mr. Williams say?" Josie wonders, looking worried by her father's facial expression.

"He said that the male victims are legit, but the women, including the high school student, are all fake as they have fake identities and just about everything else about them." Alaric repeats what Dorian told him, confusing them.

Meanwhile, Lizzie has walked over the hill then finally reaches the campground, which is totally deserted and empty making her worried as well as scared.

"Hello?" Lizzie looks around before feeling something drip on her cheek so she puts a finger to it and pulls it back, only to reveal that it's blood that drips on her cheek again.

Curious as to where it's coming from, Lizzie turns around only to feel a third drop, and she realizes that it's coming from above so she looks up.

"Ahhh!" Lizzie screams very loudly, catching everyone at the crime scene's attention but mainly Josie, who drops her bag and the clipboard she has in her hand in order to run to her twin.

"Lizzie!" Josie shouts, running over the hill with the rest of them following her but MG stays to pick up her bag, pen, and clipboard before running to Lizzie's aid as well.

Lizzie has backed away from the tree that she was near, still staring at the branches, numb and terrified.

"Lizzie. What happened? Are you okay?" Josie comforts Lizzie by hugging her after reaching her location.

Lizzie just points to where she's staring causing the rest of them, including Josie, to look where she's pointing only to be horrified by the sight of a dead body in the body in the tree.

Matt looks around, seeing a bunch more bodies strung up in other various trees nearby and around the campsite, as Josie comforts a still numb, traumatized looking Lizzie while she herself tries not to cry.

At that moment, a gorgeous brunette girl walks out of a tent and looks at all of them, her eyes glazed over meaning that she might have been compelled.

"You shouldn't be here." the girl claims, catching their attention, as they hadn't seen her before she started talking.

"This is all wrong. You should be following the path that she left behind, not the one that she's creating." the girl warns them and Josie stands up, as she was sitting on a rock with Lizzie.

"Are you talking about Hope?" Josie asks and the girl just simply nods at her.

"Okay we will. But you have to help us figure that path out." Josie agrees to the warning, then starts cautiously walking toward the compelled girl.

"What she told you. Her story is her path, do not follow, Landon's alive, continue following, he'll face her wrath, so do as your told, or all of you shall rot with knives." the girl gives them a riddle.

"What does that mean?" Josie questions confused but before she can get the girl to speak, she takes a pocket knife and jabs it in her neck.

"Nooo!" Josie tries to run to the girl but Kaleb vamp speeds and restrains her as she lets tears roll down her cheeks, knowing that she could've saved her.

Hating being restrained, Josie breaks out of Kaleb's grasp then goes to sit next to Lizzie again and they comfort each other.

"Well, since Hope doesn't want us to follow her bodies, let's get a hotel and sleep." MG suggests, and it seems to be something they can all agree to as they all nod in agreement when Josie is suddenly struck with an idea.

"Wait, sheriff, Virginia has a state sheriff doesn't it?" Josie asks, looking at the second sheriff, who nods at her.

"It does. Why?" the sheriff looks confused and Josie just smiles at him.

"Can you take us to your station? I just got an epic idea." Josie claims and they are all at the sheriff's station.

After looking through a drawer on the desk, Josie finds the book of sheriff's numbers and looks at the state sheriff's number before grabbing the phone then dialing it.

Josie coughs a couple times, then smiles to herself when someone picks up.

"Hello?" a male voice can be heard on the other end of the line and Josie does a couple of breathing, as well as coughing, exercises before speaking.

"Uh, hello. This is the sheriff from Wytheville, I'm going to need you to write down two descriptions then sketch them." Josie puts on this fake and very deep voice that sounds nothing like the sheriff.

Oh, uh yeah ok. What are the descriptions?" The state sheriff asks after Josie could hear him scrambling for pen and paper.

Josie gives him the descriptions of Hope and Landon then tells him to sketch them into pictures and scan them onto his computer.

She can hear him do just that.

"Okay. The sketches are on my computer, now what?" The sheriff wonders, awaiting Josie's order.

"Now, email those sketches to every state sheriff and tell them to keep a look out for them. When they call you, call me immediately." Josie demands then hangs up the phone, looking very happy with herself.

"This is a great plan." Josie states happily as she continues to smile to herself while everyone looks impressed by her action.

"The state sheriff just texted saying that the email was sent." The sheriff confirms, looking at his cell phone.

"Good. We let the other state sheriffs look for them while we figure out that riddle. Right now, Hope believes that we took her riddle seriously, let's keep it that way. Besides, I just bought us time to actually sleep." Josie looks very confident in herself, believing that she has fooled Hope.

Meanwhile, at the state sheriff's station, it appears he lied as he is just now creating an email with the sketches attached.

"I wouldn't hit send if I were you." Landon claims as he leans in the doorway.

The sheriff immediately recognizes him from the description he was given and he reaches for the phone, about to re-dial but Hope presses a button on it as he puts the phone to his ear.

"I'd listen to him, if I were you sheriff." Hope is sitting on the desk still holding the button down and the sheriff puts the phone in order to remove the email.

"What-what do want?" The sheriff stutters moving his rolling chair backwards, clearly trying to see if he can reach the door.

"To pass a message. It appears that the first one failed." Hope reveals then she threateningly approaches him as he continues to roll back in his chair, looking scared which causes her to smirk before attacking him.

At the sheriff's station where the rest of the group are, they're about to leave when the landline rings and the sheriff answers it.

"Hello? I'm sorry I can't hear you. Oh, okay, no, stay exactly where you are. Help is on the way." the sheriff hangs up and everybody looks at him curiously.

"A witness to a murder just called." the sheriff says plainly causing the group to sigh in annoyance.

They all head to the scene, only to find out that they are at the state sheriff's station and look at his mutilated body in horror.

Matt immediately goes to check his computer, only to find out he has no recently sent emails.

"Uh, you said that he texted you saying that he sent the sketches out?" Matt looks at the sheriff questioningly.

"Yeah, that's what he texted." the sheriff confirms this as he nods.

"Well, he has no history of sending any emails today." Matt tells the room, which shocks them all.

"Um, guys." Lizzie is looking at the body in horror which causes them to all look at the body.

There's a note on his chest, that has Landon's blood as the ink, that reads;

_'Wrong move, bitches'_

"Damn it. She was one step ahead of us." Josie looks pissed that her plan was interrupted when she hears something from a back closet.

Josie walks over to the door cautiously, only to immediately hear teeth chattering and shaking.

"Mom." A little girl runs into Josie's arms the second she opens the door and doesn't question the girl's words as she reciprocates the hug.

The sheriff seems to recognize the little girl as he comments on her.

"That's the state sheriff's daughter, her mother died when she was two. But your friend does look a lot like her." The sheriff looks at scene that is Josie hugging a girl.

"How much does she look like the girl's mother?" MG asks curiously, so the sheriff shows them a photo that's on his phone of the little girl's mother.

She might as well be Josie's doppelganger if it weren't for the small differences in the face here and there, yet the eye color and hair color are clearly the major differences.

The kid looks like Hope and Josie's love child, as she has Josie's hair and eye color but Hope's eyes, nose, and ears along with Josie's mouth yet has freckles like Hope did when she was a child.

"How old are you again?" Josie wonders, after the hug breaks pretending that she is the girl's mother.

"I'm four now. I'm so glad you came back for me, mommy." The girl hugs her again and Josie just picks her up so she can walk back over to the group.

"You guys can go to a hotel and sleep. I'll call you if I get a lead or another crime scene." the sheriff assures them, so they all finally leave to get that hotel room.

"If I'm being honest, I'm glad he's dead. He had a habit of being aggressive towards his kid after his wife died." the sheriff reveals to Alaric before he leaves then he walks away to continue investigating the crime scene, allowing Alaric to leave, looking disgusted by what the sheriff has just told him.


	11. Same Hotel, Unknowing Residents

The group head to a hotel and get a room with two beds along with a sofa.

"Well, me and Josie get this bed." Lizzie claims, jumping on the one bed, it was obvious that Penelope was going to go for, which Lizzie probably knew.

"Whatever. I'm going to make adjustments to the bathroom, so there's more than one shower. And then I'm going to take one." Penelope admits before walking into the bathroom.

"While she does that, I'm going to blow up the mattresses that I never leave home without." Josie reveals happily as she puts the little girl down then removes three blow-up mattresses from her duffle bag.

"Can I help?" the little girl asks, smiling at Josie.

"Of course you can." Josie replies not seeing a problem with her helping out yet she is curious on if the girl can even blow the mattresses up.

So, Josie and the little girl blow up the three mattresses, which takes a while as neither of them are that good at blowing.

"Okay, who calls what mattress?" Josie wonders, looking around the room once she's finished.

"Uh, where are the mattresses going to go?" Kaleb questions while having his hand raised making Josie look dumb-struck, as she hadn't thought about that.

"Uh, well, they could go, um…" Josie trails off as she thinks about Kaleb's question, looking around the room as she contemplates it.

Luckily for her, MG places each mattress somewhere not in the way but not difficult to reach, yet these places were probably what he was going to tell her about before she interrupted him when he was about to speak because she thought he was gonna ask if he could help.

"Thanks, MG." Josie thanks him and he just smiles at her, when Penelope pokes her head out of the bathroom door.

"Altered bathroom is ready. The new showers aren't tied to this place, but only three in here at a time. I only managed to add two showers to this." Penelope reveals then goes back in the bathroom where you can hear her start the hotel shower.

Meanwhile in the same hotel, Landon gets shoved into a room, looking annoyed as he lets himself get shoved.

"Okay, I'm inside. Although, I don't know why you're being so pushy." Landon admits as he is clearly curious while Hope walks in the room, closing the door behind her once she is inside.

"I wanted to stay on the move. As I recall, you were the one who wanted to stay in a hotel." Hope brings up bitterly but Landon rolls his eyes and scoffs at this.

"No. I said although I like sleeping in the wilderness, I would like to sleep on something that isn't as uncomfortable as the forest floor, like a log, or fallen branch, or something. I never said anything about staying in a hotel." Landon reminds Hope with an annoyed tone, clearly hating the fact that she wasn't listening to him.

"Well, we're already here. So are you complaining or are you chilling?" Hope wonders also annoyed as she crosses her arms and Landon sighs as he hops on one bed, clearly still annoyed.

Just then, the lobbyist walks in with a couple of shopping bags.

"Here you go, miss. Where should I put these?" the lobbyist asks, curiously.

"Right there, thank you." Hope points to where she wants the bags, which is where they are placed before the lobbyist leaves.

Once she does, Hope picks up a bag and tosses it over to Landon, startling him.

"What's this?" Landon wonders as he looks inside.

"Fresh clothes. You can take a shower first, I have to go somewhere. I'll be back, so don't leave." Hope demands threateningly then leaves the room so Landon gets off the bed to walk into the bathroom so he can shower.

In the group's hotel room, Josie is organizing bags that she asked Emma to magically send over after giving her a note asking if she could do so.

Josie tosses each bag on a different bed since they all have labels on them but as MG was in the shower, she tossed his bag to just outside the closed bathroom door.

Two minutes later, Penelope finally gets out of the shower and walks out of the bathroom in a towel, freshened up, only to trip over the bag Josie tossed in front of the door.

"Ow! Who the hell put this bag here?" Penelope shifts around to see the bag and Josie looks apologetic.

"Sorry. I had Emma send over some bags with pajamas along with clean clothes and those are supposed to go to MG." Josie explains after apologizing causing Penelope to sigh before standing up.

"Where's my bag?" Penelope questions and Kaleb tosses it to her which she catches, without dropping her towel, then walks back in the bathroom to change into pajamas.

Once they've all showered and changed into pajamas, except Josie, they're all chilling around, happy that they can finally relax.

Josie walks into the bathroom with the little girl who keeps calling her 'mom', only for her to get nervous.

"I don't want a bath." the little girl states stubbornly, as she pouts.

"But baths are fun. Just trust me ok Sophia." the girl looks at her with a smile on her face.

"You just named me." Sophia claims happily which makes Josie realize that she was nameless until this point.

"You didn't have a name before?" Josie looks confused but still manages to smile slightly.

"No, you said you'd name me when I turned double digits." Sophia reveals, still believing that Josie is her mother.

"Right. Well, bathtime." Josie exclaims happily then fills the bathtub not high at all.

Once she gives little Sophia a bath, Josie puts her in pajamas that belong to one of the younger students she asked Emma to grab and put in her bag.

"Alright, now I have to take a shower. So can you go wait with Lizzie for me?" Josie wonders causing Sophia to nod and walk out to go chill by Lizzie.

Josie finally takes a shower, making her immediately feel much cleaner, and she walks out in her own pajamas, then hops on the bed with Sophia and Lizzie.

"How long are we keeping her?" Lizzie whispers to Josie, looking at the sleeping Sophia with a smile.

"I don't know. She thinks I'm her mom, which officially makes you her aunt." Josie whispers back, clearly unsure.

"Well, we should probably take her back to the school before Hope goes into another state." Lizzie deduces but decides to backtrack when Josie looks sadly at the fact of sending her away, even if it is to the school.

"I mean, we can't keep her on this journey. She needs more sleep than we do and she really shouldn't see what Hope does to her victims. That would leave a mark no one can erase." Lizzie assures her sister why it's for the best that they send her back to the school.

"Well, I think she'll fit in at our school perfectly. Seeing as how she's a witch." Penelope points out in a whisper causing Lizzie and Josie to finally sense it on her.

"She's a practicing one too. It's probably why her dad was aggressive towards her." Penelope whispers looking shocked as she reveals that she eavesdropped on the last words the sheriff gave Alaric, causing him to roll his eyes, as he can hear them because none of them are sleeping except Sophia.

"She's four and the sheriff said her mother died two years ago, which was when he had started getting aggressive towards her. Ughh, some people just genuinely disgust me." Lizzie scoffs in disgust as she whispers, yet revealing that she was also eavesdropping on the sheriff's conversation with her dad.

Meanwhile in Hope and Landon's room, Landon gets out of the shower and walks out of the bathroom to get dressed, since Hope isn't back yet.

However, Landon gets on a t-shirt and boxers, then starts to put pants on, when Hope returns.

"Oh. I thought you would've been dressed by now." Hope assumes with hand covering her eyes closed causing Landon to pull the pants up.

"You can look now." Landon claims and Hope partially peeks through her fingers before dropping her hand completely.

"I thought you'd be in street clothes not pajamas. Oh well, whatever." Hope brushes off his outfit choice as she rolls her eyes.

"Well we are sleeping here, aren't we? Maybe you should change into pajamas after showering too?" Landon suggests and although it's very obvious that they don't like each other at all, Hope seems to believe that it would be the smart choice since they are staying the night as she doesn't argue with his suggestion.

"Okay, fine." Hope agrees and takes off her boots then starts removing her jacket when Landon looks up from the mini fridge that's in the room.

"Whoa, what are you doing?" Landon asks, confused as Hope lets her jacket fall off her arms to reveal that her shirt is practically backless, since her back is facing Landon.

"I'm getting ready for my shower." Hope responds plainly as she reaches for the zipper that's on the back.

She pulls on it, causing it to move down slightly before stopping causing Hope to start yanking on it, yet to no avail.

"What is wrong with this stupid zipper?" Hope mutters under her breath as she continues to yank it.

"I can help. If you want." Landon recommends and Hope drops her hand from the zipper, meaning that she wants him to help with it.

Landon walks over to her then pulls on the zipper gently before putting a hand up her shirt, reaching the location where it's stuck.

This act causes Hope to tilt her head and sigh silently in pleasure, unknowingly enjoying that his hand is up her shirt, as he tries to fix the problem.

"Got it." Landon removes his hand and unzips the back of her shirt.

"Somehow, your skin got caught in the zipper's track." Landon explains as he backs away from her.

"Thanks." Hope states kind of awkwardly then walks into the bathroom, starting to remove the halter part of her shirt, then kicks the door closed with her foot.

Landon plops on the bed then turns on the TV, which has him watching Spongebob but he's too focused on his thoughts to pay attention to it.

'My captor is in the shower. Correction; my really hot captor is in the shower. I could try to make a run for it. Nah, she'd catch me, even if she were in a towel. She has a really sexy back though and she wasn't wearing a bra this entire time, which makes me wonder how uncomfortable she might've been for a month in that cell. Probably very uncomfortable. I wonder where my brother is, I feel like I haven't seen Rafael in ages. I hope he's doing okay. You know what I think I want to bang my really hot captor, is that weird? Eh, most likely.' Landon was so lost in thought, thinking about various things, well, mainly his captor, that he didn't even hear the shower turn off.

Eventually he comes back to the real world when Hope pokes her head out of the bathroom door and asks him a question.

"Hey, who are you talking to?" Hope wonders, looking at him confused.

"Hmm?" Landon looks at her curiously.

"You were talking to yourself." Hope clarifies making Landon feel mildly embarrassed.

"Um, yeah. Just talking to the TV." Landon lies, embarrassed that she might've heard exactly what he was talking about.

"Okay." Hope looks skeptical but retreats to the bathroom causing Landon to sigh in relief before he actually starts focusing on the TV.

It isn't long before Hope pokes her head out of the bathroom again, catching Landon's attention immediately.

"This is awkward. Uh, could you grab me a bra from the pink bag?" Hope asks awkwardly, pointing to the pink bag.

So Landon gets off the bed and looks for a bra before pulling a really cute purple that fades to black as it's lined with dark grey lace, the straps being the same as it's lined with.

"This work?" Landon holds it up looking awkward and Hope looks in love with it.

"Yes, that's perfect." Hope claims then walks out of the bathroom and has her back face him again, dropping her towel completely, revealing her very short pajama shorts.

"Help me put it on." Hope suggests as she pulls her hair over one of her shoulders, it no longer being in the ponytail that she formerly had, not knowing that Landon is staring at her back longingly.

"Uh, yeah. Sure." Landon sputters out weirdly as he places the bra on her chest then starts to hook it, trying hard not to focus on Hope's bared neck.

Unfortunately Landon messes up twice, which is very awkward for him, but Hope doesn't seem to mind it as she sighs silently in pleasure once more when she feels his hands on her back.

"Done." Landon finally managed to get all of the hooks on the same row, which he was having slight difficulty with.

"Great." Hope slides the straps on her arms then adjusts the bra before heading back into the bathroom, which she keeps the door open as she just puts on an oversized sweatshirt and heads back out, putting her hair in a high ponytail like she had previously.

Landon is about to question it before she starts braiding the ponytail, causing him to no longer feel the need to question it.

Hope plops on the bed Landon was sitting on and starts to surf through the channels boredly.

"You want to watch something?" Landon wonders curiously sitting on the bed near the headboard while Hope's in the front of the bed.

"No." Hope frustratedly turns the TV off with the remote then turns her body around so she can face Landon.

"I'm bored." Hope exclaims but Landon just gets a look of confusion.

"I'm not sure what you want me to do about that." Landon admits before standing and walking over to the mini fridge again.

"Me neither." Hope pouts then gets a look of annoyance when she sees Landon rooting through the mini fridge.

"What are you doing?" Hope questions, clearly annoyed.

"Look Hope, I do everything you want me to. I even let you feed on me without you just helping yourself. If you want me to be your prisoner or hostage, then fine I will be, but the least that you could do is feed me." Landon retorts sounding more annoyed than she is but feels he should backtrack she when glares at him, however she doesn't argue back with him.

"You know what? You're right, I think I'll order us a pizza." Hope walks over to the hotel phone, leaving Landon shocked that she didn't get aggressive with him like she usually does when he talks back to her.

However, Hope doesn't ask what he wants as she just orders a large cheese pizza with breadsticks and a two-liter of sierra mist.

Back with the group, they are still trying to figure out what they're going to do with the little girl that's in love with Josie, mainly because she looks like her mother.

"I could do a simple transportation spell and send her back to the school." Penelope suggests but MG notices something wrong in her tone.

"What's the bad news?" MG calls her out on not having her usually confident tone, so she relents.

"I've never transported another person somewhere before, so she might not survive it." Penelope said the wrong thing as Josie looks horrified by this statement, so she decides to backtrack.

"But I could go with her to ensure it." Penelope adds with a nod, and can see that this slightly eases Josie's nerves.

"Okay, we can do that in the morning. I'm exhausted." Lizzie claims with a yawn then lays back on the bed and falls asleep very quickly causing everyone to follow suit.

Back in Hope's hotel room, the pizza just showed up, Landon was kind enough to pay since it didn't cost much and the two of them are sitting on the floor eating the pizza.

"You know, you are not that bad. When you aren't being totally aggressive and murder-y." Landon claims as he takes a bite of the slice he has in his hand causing Hope to momentarily blush at this comment.

"Well your not horrible either. When you aren't talking." Hope tilts her head to the side as she adds her second statement.

"Ouch. How rude." Landon feigns mildly offended which causes both of them to chuckle at this before resuming eating their pizza.

When they're done eating, Landon takes the pizza box and places it on the table, unsure of how to dispose of it, then turns to face Hope, who was watching him clean up.

"We're fed, we're clean, we should probably check out and keep moving." Hope recommends, seeming mildly uncomfortable and antsy.

"Um, okay. I'll go put some jeans on." Landon walks into the bathroom, not knowing that he didn't close the door fully.

So while Hope is looking through a bag that she thinks has her clothes inside, she partially glances up to see Landon putting on jeans, as he just pulled them up.

Hope shakes her head after watching for a moment and goes back to looking for clothes to wear.

Landon gets out of the bathroom in jeans, and looks at Hope curiously, as she still roots through the bag for clothes.

"Did you want help?" Landon's voice startles her as she jumps up and turns to face him.

"What, no. I'm good. I was just ensuring there was no orange or yellow in there." Hope lies as she motions to the pink bag behind her, but Landon doesn't buy it as he knows that bag is where the bras and underwear are.

"I could've told you that. I think your clothes are in the green bag." Landon points to a green bag that isn't far from the pink one.

"Right. I knew that." Hope tucks some loose strands of hair behind her ear looking awkward and embarrassed as she walks over to then starts rooting through the green bag while Landon watches on, sitting on the bed.

After a moment, Hope sighs in frustration and puts the bag on Landon's lap, wanting him to find an outfit for her.

So Landon looks through the bag after putting it to the side of him, only to realize that this bag is just filled with jackets and not clothes like he had assumed.

"Well, I found a jacket that you could wear." Landon claims but Hope just scoffs.

"Yeah. Well, what about the rest of the outfit?" Hope retorts bitterly as she rolls her eyes, making Landon sigh in annoyance.

"Ok, what gives? You were in a decent mood, like ten minutes ago." Landon points out, putting the bag on the floor as he stands up while she continues to look at him.

"You put me in a mood." Hope still looks at him, pissed but this slightly changes when he walks closer to her.

"How? How am I possibly putting you in a…" Landon gets cut off by Hope abruptly kissing him on the mouth, similar to what she did with Lizzie but she seems to enjoy this one more.

Landon finds himself reciprocating the kiss, even though he doesn't entirely want to give in to his captor, but this is mainly because he's not sure how she'd feel about it.

The kiss ends but it was in that moment Hope figured out why she was angry with him, so realizing that he seems interested, she decides to kiss him again, this one both of them leaning into it.

"I can't do this." Landon backs away after the kiss ends, this attitude seeming to sour Hope's mood once more.

"Why not?" Hope looks annoyed, as usual, at Landon's resistance.

"Because I won't be able to stop if I go there and I'm already having difficulty keeping my eyes off your neck, for unknown reasons." Landon explains and Hope realizes that he is in fact interested in her but then she remembers something.

"You're staring at my neck, even though I'm the vampire. It's probably my blood, you had a small amount of it in the woods and now you want more. I don't know why, but for some reason my blood is very addictive for people I don't turn into vampires." Hope reveals, confused by how her blood works, then approaches Landon, placing her hands on the sides of his face.

Landon is really trying to resist Hope's advances, but he lets her kiss him again despite his urges of not wanting her.

Hope lets Landon leave to sit on the bed, which she follows him to, but he pushes her away.

"Just, please stay away from me." Landon pleads putting his face in his hands.

"It's bad enough I'm your hostage. That alone is making you a temptation for me." Landon admits, looking at her before putting his face back in his hands and Hope concludes that he is going through withdrawal from lack of her blood, which happens several hours after you drink it.

However, it's been nearly thirty-six hours since he last fed from her which explains his behavior, so Hope ignores his pleas for her to stay away from him, and she walks closer to where his is, on the bed.

"Landon. You need to drink my blood. You're going through withdrawal from lack of it." Hope informs him which causes him to look at her causing her to smile.

She removes his hands off of his lap in order for her to sit on it, which she does, and he automatically places his hands around her waist.

"What the hell are you doing?" Landon hasn't looked more confused in his life but Hope doesn't respond, she takes a pocket knife she kept in her old jean pocket and slowly slices the side of her neck open, tempting Landon even more as he attempts to refuse it.

Hope puts her bleeding neck in front Landon's mouth and try as he might, he ultimately relents, letting himself bite her neck which causes her to moan and arch her back as he pulls her body closer to him.

He takes a lot more than he did the last time, when he fed from her wrist but Hope doesn't care as she's more focused on trying to lower her sighs and moans from it.

Landon eventually stops feeding on her which causes her to look at him, sighing in pleasure, before deciding to feed on him, simply because she hasn't fed on anyone in a while, which Landon lets her do so as he finds pleasure in having her feed off of him.

Once she's finished feeding on him, they look at each longingly before embracing in a passionate, and mildly aggressive, kiss where it doesn't take long before Landon starts undoing her braided high ponytail causing her to retaliate by undoing his belt.

After her hair is completely down, Hope rips Landon's shirt after unbuttoning his jeans and he pulls her sweatshirt over her head revealing the bra he picked out for her.

Hope pushes him on the bed as they make out then Landon flips her over so he's on top of her and they proceed to have sex.


	12. Murderous Intentions

In the morning, at the group's hotel room, Penelope transports herself and Sophia to the Salvatore Boarding School, as they planned last night.

"Now that we're all well rested, and we still haven't gotten any calls from anybody, what should we do?" MG asks, looking around the room enthusiastically after Penelope returns.

"It looks like she's just going to remain asleep." Josie assumes with a whisper as she points to an unconscious Lizzie, whereas everyone else is awake.

"Sleeping in sounds like a good plan to me." Penelope lies down on the blow up mattress she was on last night and stretches before curling up.

However, before all of them could get on the mattresses they have, Alaric's phone goes off, waking up Lizzie.

"What? Merry Christmas!" Lizzie looked around for a moment, told them to celebrate a holiday they were nowhere near, then fell back into unconsciousness.

Alaric good-naturedly rolls his eyes before answering the phone.

"Hey, Dorian." Alaric greets his friend.

"Hey Ric. So, I was looking into the male victims and restarting background checks on the female ones then I ran checks on the science facilities the scientist families worked at." Dorian reveals in one breath, then Ric can hear him drink something.

"Okay, and?" Alaric looks concerned for his companion.

"And the female victims remain fake, but I thought I'd double check. That's not the weird part, the weird part is that the science facilities don't check out." Dorian claims, shocking and confusing Ric.

"What does that mean?" Alaric wonders sounding concerned as all the students, minus Lizzie, look at him curiously.

"It means that the buildings those science facilities are in and the victims families are working all started off as abandoned ones. I mean, they have websites and things that make it legit but all in all it's just a ruse." Dorian explains, keeping Alaric shocked, yet shocking Josie, who's eavesdropping on the call.

"That is weird. I would say keep me posted but I feel like you should get some sleep. So, why don't you do that." Alaric recommends then ends the call, and realizes the students are looking at him.

"Well? What did he say?" Penelope looks at him, sounding mildly impatient as her arms are crossed.

Knowing he can't keep secrets from any of them since they are assisting in finding Hope, Alaric confesses about the buildings, shocking all of them, yet it not registering in their minds on how it's important.

In Hope and Landon's room, Hope is sitting on the edge of the bed after a night of hooking up, putting her bra back on as she already put on new underwear.

"Hey. I thought you would sleep in." Landon presumes sleepily and she smiles at this.

"Normally I would've, but we're on a clock. We should've been out of here last night." Hope reminds him as she looks through the bag that actually has clothes for her in it.

"Well, you didn't have to kiss me, or tempt me with your blood. I mean, last I checked I didn't make you do either of those things." Landon exclaims as he just casually sits in the bed, watching her look for clothes, keeping his eyes mainly on her ass since she's bent over.

"Shut up." Hope says in a teasing manner rather than a threatening one, as she smiles to herself about last night.

"Alright, heels or boots?" Hope holds up two different pairs of shoes in front of Landon.

"Combat boots. They will be easier to walk in." Landon explains and Hope nods.

"Ok, purple or green?" Hope doesn't hold anything up but still looks at him for an answer.

"Uh, green." Landon answers uneasily as he doesn't know what the colors mean.

"Black or white?" Hope questions making Landon more confused.

"I want to say white but since you might have a murder victim not long after we leave, and I know how you kill people, so black would be the smarter option." Landon gives her an understandable and reasonable explanation, which Hope can agree on.

"True, it would be the smarter move. But white is much cuter." Hope thinks aloud and Landon rolls his eyes, just knowing that she's going to choose white which he can assume are code colors for clothes since she's in a bra and underwear.

"Last question. Up-do or side-braid?" Hope continues to look at him as she fiddles with her hair, by pulling it all up then putting it to the side.

"Side braid." Landon states plainly, simply because he liked seeing her hair on one side.

"Great. Now get dressed so we can leave." Hope demands then walks into the bathroom to get changed and Landon leaves bed to start getting dressed.

Once they're both in clothes, they check out and are on the move again in the woods.

Unbeknownst to Landon, Hope is wearing a feminine version of something that her dad wore; a white shirt, green jeans, a leather jacket, with combat boots, but her hair is in a side braid and her shirt has lace sleeves, not that Landon can tell as she is wearing the leather jacket that he picked out last night.

Three hours later in the group's room, they're packing up the bags Emma sent over after they all changed into the spare clothes she sent.

"Alright, let's blow this popsicle stand." Kaleb sounds enthusiastic for once.

"Uh, Lizzie it was a metaphor." MG quickly tells Lizzie, whose hand had a flame in it as she was actually going to set the building ablaze, who puts the flame out with a frown.

"Whatever. Let's get breakfast, I'm starving." Lizzie skips out of the hotel room with the rest of the group following her.

While waiting for the elevator, Matt gets a phone call, this one being from an unknown number instead of a contact he has.

"Hello? What? Uh, yeah, no. I'll be there right away. Thanks." Matt ends the call with the rest of the group looking at him, worried.

"We can get some food on the way. A sheriff from a town in Tennessee just called saying that they have a mutilated victim." Matt shares with the group causing them all to groan in annoyance and they all hear the others' stomachs rumble with hunger.

"You're getting us McDonald's on the way." Lizzie demands Ric with a grumpy tone and they all get on the elevator in order to leave the hotel to get to the crime scene.

In Alaric's van, they're all eating various breakfast foods from McDonald's as they drive to the crime scene.

"Hmm. Let's play I Spy." Josie suggests once they all finish eating.

"Ok. I spy with my little eye, something black." Lizzie makes her pitch but Josie looks confused by it.

"Um Lizzie, let's keep the guesses on the outside of the car." Josie claims, assuming that her twin was being racist but Lizzie scoffs at this.

"Uh I am, Jos. I'm looking at that injured wolf on the side of the road. You guys suck at this game." Lizzie exclaims after pointing to an actual wolf, that's black, on the side of the road.

Alaric decides to stop the car, pulling over, so he can examine the clearly injured wolf.

The wolf growls at them when they start to approach him but seems to take an interest in Josie, who walks cautiously towards him.

"We should probably go investigate the crime scene." Matt tries to get them to focus on why they're on the road, but Josie is too fixated on the wolf, who seems to really like her company as he lets her pet him.

"We can take him with. But he has to go in the trunk." Alaric allows the injured wolf to tag along so Josie assures the wolf her friends are cool and she helps him hop in the trunk.

Once they're all at the crime scene, Penelope tends to the injured wolf while everyone else heads to the scene, which is a dead blonde girl, so Lizzie and Josie head to the scarf-wearing brunette in order to interrogate her.

"Dead blonde. Makes sense since the last one she killed was a brunette male." MG points out the pattern that she's clearly sticking to.

Once the wolf has been fixed up, he goes over to the crime scene and starts sniffing around, helping them investigate.

Unfortunately, once Lizzie and Josie return from interrogating, the wolf starts walking away from the crime scene, which causes Lizzie and MG to follow him since Ric to focused on getting informed of what happened to pay attention.

They follow him all the way to a secluded part of the woods, pretty far away from the crime scene.

"Okay buddy, where are you leading us?" MG asks as he looks around the area, following the wolf, who has his nose to the ground constantly sniffing around.

"Far away from the crime scene and civilization. We should probably head back." Lizzie suggests then turns around when the wolf howls causing her to turn back to face the wolf.

"What? Did he find something?" Lizzie wonders curiously as he continues to howl and attempt to climb a tree.

MG walks over and looks at what he's howling at, gently touching the bark of the tree.

"Landon's blood. He might be nearby." MG deduces so Lizzie, MG, and the wolf start looking around but it doesn't take long before MG's neck gets snapped.

"MG!" Lizzie runs over to and crouches down to his unconscious body, then tries to shake him awake while the wolf continues to sniff around.

All of a sudden, Lizzie gets her hair yanked on before feeling herself be pulled up violently by an unknown force.

"Well, well, well, look at this, your team sucks at following orders, and riddles." Hope whispers in her ear, sounding very pissed.

"I think I should teach your friends a more effective lesson starting with you." Hope grits through her teeth before slamming Lizzie against a tree, knocking her unconscious then vamp speeds off with her, leaving the wolf howling by MG's body waiting for someone to help.

Kaleb eventually picks up the howling with his vamp hearing.

"Do you guys hear that?" Kaleb questions, listening intently.

"Hear what?" Penelope looks at Kaleb confused, but Josie seems to hear it as well.

"The wolf. It's howling, I can hear it too." Josie claims so all of them head to the wolf by following the howls.

Once they reach the area where the wolf is, Josie immediately runs to MG, who's still unconscious.

"MG?" Josie looks him over, concerned, when he starts waking up which causes the wolf to stop howling.

MG immediately sits up and looks over at the wolf, who stares back at him.

"Where is she? Where'd she go?" MG looks frantic as he talks to the wolf.

""Who are you talking about?" Josie looks concerned by MG's behavior, as does the rest of the them.

"Lizzie. She was with me. Someone took Lizzie." MG concludes once he saw that Lizzie wasn't amongst the rest of the group and this revelation appears to horrify everyone but none more than Josie and Alaric.


	13. Who Am I Without You?

"What do you mean someone took Lizzie?" Josie sounds infuriated with MG for once.

"We were following the wolf because he picked up a scent; Landon's blood. Then I get my neck snapped and that's where my knowledge ends." MG explains and although Josie still seems to be fuming with furiousness, she looks less angry at MG.

All of a sudden the wolf starts howling again, which was a bad move because it seemed to piss Josie off.

"Ughh, shut up!" Josie yells at the wolf, who stops howling and briefly whines, looking at her sadly.

"I'm sorry. It's just not helping me, at all." Josie apologizes to the wolf, who starts to wag his tail happily.

Josie pats his head, frowning in sadness.

"You know that wolf really likes to howl." Kaleb claims, his tone implying that he finds it very weird.

"Yeah, I know. It's like he's trying to speak to us." MG adds to Kaleb's uncertainty yet these apparently seemed to be the right words, as the wolf starts jumping around and continues howling at them.

"That's because I think he is." Alaric deduces as the wolf keeps jumping around happily.

Then Josie notices something about the wolf, something she didn't before, and she gasps in realization.

"Oh my god, I don't think he's a wolf. I think he's a werewolf, who somehow got trapped in wolf form." Josie admits in shock and although this shocks the rest of the group, the wolf continues to howl and jump around happily, as though they figured it out.

"He wasn't unconscious as he alerted us to MG's location. That means he is the only one who knows what happened to Lizzie." Penelope concludes, this realization makes them glad but it doesn't take long before their moods turn sour, or at least Josie's mood.

"Well, unless you know a spell that can translate dog howling, how are we going to revert him back to being human?" Josie wonders, sounding sour and bitter.

This question causes the wolf to stop howling and jumping around, then run to Josie, rubbing up against her once more.

"We get it. You like Josie." MG sighs out annoyed, causing the wolf to growl at him then return to rubbing up against Josie before walking away.

"Ooh nice leg warmers, Jo Jo." Penelope compliments her but Josie looks confused.

"What leg warmers?" Josie voices her confusion then looks down at her gray jeans only to see her entire calves covered in black, so she shakes and brushes it off.

"Ughh, I'm covered in wolf fur." Josie continues shaking and brushing the fur off her jeans in disgust.

The wolf returns then jumps on Josie, his paws on her stomach, and starts howling at her.

"No." Josie says strictly and the wolf hops down then does it again.

"Ok, sit." the wolf sits down, looking at her expectantly as she crouches down to his eye level.

"Paw." Josie holds out her hand and wolf places on paw in her hand, then removes it to place his other paw in her hand.

Josie notices a silver ring on one of his claws, which she examines curiously, unsure of what it is.

"He has ring on this paw. That might be what's keeping him as a wolf." Josie assumes causing the wolf to howl in her face, meaning that it is.

"Ohh, so he doesn't actually like you. He just wants you to revert him to normal." Kaleb sighs in realization causing Josie to glare at him and then roll her eyes.

"Ok, uh if I siphon this ring, then someone tell me that they have spare clothes." Josie looks around at the group, who realize that if he's a wolf then reverting back would put him in the nude.

"Uh, I still have my school uniform. It isn't clean but it might work." MG suggests then goes to Alaric's car to get the duffle bag Emma sent him and returns with it, tossing the bag to Josie, who catches it.

So, with her eyes closed, Josie starts siphoning the magic that created the ring while everyone else turned around, waiting.

Josie completes the siphoning and she can hear the person reach for the bag then most likely get dressed.

"You guys can look now." a male voice speaks after a few moments pass so they all turn around and Josie opens her eyes as she stands to her feet.

He's a very attractive, dark-skinned male that Josie takes an immediate liking to as he smiles nervously.

"Thanks." he thanks Josie causing her to smile at him slightly.

"Who are you?" Alaric asks curiously.

"My name's Rafael." Rafael introduces himself and Penelope looks confused.

"Why were you on the side of the road?" Penelope wonders, voicing her confusion.

"I was tracking my brother until I got caught in a bear trap." Rafael explains which just confuses all of them even more.

"Your brother?" MG questions and Rafael just nods at him.

"Yep. Landon, I've been following them ever since he was taken off your school grounds." Rafael reveals, shocking them.

"That's implying that you were on school grounds." Kaleb points but Rafael shakes his head.

"Not exactly. I mainly stayed off campus but I'd show up if I thought Landon was in trouble." Rafael claims causing them all to nod understandingly.

"Wait a second. I just remembered something." Josie just blurts happily as she searches through her bag and gently takes out the glass talisman.

"What the hell is that?" Penelope asks, looking at the object suspiciously.

"It's a talisman that Lizzie made. It represents Hope's magic, so we'll always be able to find her even if she's cloaked. She gave it to me for safe keeping." Josie reveals, this answer impressing Penelope.

"How handy." Kaleb nods at the talisman, liking the purpose of it.

"Now, I just need a map." Josie claims happily.

After Josie gets her hands on a map, she places some dirt on it, then chants the locator spell, which makes her look possessed but she's just getting visions of Hope's location.

"You know you could take a break, sit down, have some water, if she's getting too heavy for you." Hope gives Landon options but he scoffs at her making conversation.

"You know, we could just walk in silence, or tell me where you want to go next so we aren't aimlessly walking around." Landon suggests, clearly annoyed with Hope, who just rolls her eyes.

It's revealed that Landon has an unconscious Lizzie over his shoulders while they walk and talk, about not talking when Hope abruptly stops walking.

"What is it? Getting sore feet?" Landon mocks as he turns around to see that his companion stopped walking.

"No, something feels off. I just can't place it." Hope admits, looking angry then she walks over to Lizzie and pushes some hair off her face, revealing a bad wound on her face.

"You did something. What was it, hmm? Because I can feel that you did something but you aren't doing anything. So, what did you do?" Hope keeps brushing the hair off Lizzie's face as she interrogates her unconscious body.

"Ahhh!" Hope screams furiously, letting a large amount of power out of her as she does.

However, this causes Josie to snap back into reality, where she is looking confused yet since she was thrown back to where she was, she almosts drops the talisman but she manages to catch it before it falls.

Unfortunately, since Hope let a bunch of her magic out, the talisman shatters to pieces, ruining their chances at tracking her which devastates Josie, as she holds some of the shattered glass pieces.

They all stand there in shock and devastation, looking at the broken glass, as they're all unsure of what to do.

Josie looks like she's about to lose it, and have an episode like she's used to Lizzie having but she keeps a lid on her emotions, most likely wanting to save them for when she sees Hope again.

"What did you see?" Penelope wonders in a gentle tone, not wanting to aggravate her.

"A vision. Landon had Lizzie over his shoulders while Hope was talking. She could sense the talisman tracking her and she let out a large amount of her magic. That snapped me back here then caused the talisman to shatter." Josie explains as she dusts the glass off of her hands.

"If she was capable of doing that, then it must mean that she's closer than we thought." MG assures Josie, who continues to look devastated, most likely as a result of her twin not being with her.

"Not like it matters. She destroyed the only thing that was helping us track her, so now we have nothing." Josie mutters under her breath bitterly as she looks at the clipboard that she writes on everytime her and Lizzie interrogate a scarf-wearing brunette at the blonde female crime scenes.

"Ok, you write on that at every female crime scene that we go to. What's on it?" Kaleb wonders impatiently, pushing Josie to talk.

"Everytime that Lizzie said something close to moving and motivational, I'd write it down. So when we finally track Hope, she'd have a speech in order to talk her down." Josie reveals as she continues to write on it.

"Why are you writing on it now?" MG looks curious and confused.

"Well, Lizzie's just been abducted, therefore no motivational words. So now I have to try and write a speech that she admitted probably wasn't going to work." Josie continues writing on the clipboard, sounding in near tears while she spoke.

"Why write it at all? I mean you literally just said that she thought it wasn't going to work." Penelope points but Josie sighs in frustration.

"Lizzie believed it had a 30% percent chance of working, which means she wasn't going to stop writing it. Even if there was a 70% chance of it not working and pissing Hope off." Josie admits, her tone sounding slightly furious as she continues to find the right way to word Lizzie's motivational sentences into a speech.

**(Flashback)**

Lizzie and Josie are in the woods away from, yet still near, a crime scene and Lizzie's sitting on a log while Josie stands behind her with a hand on her shoulder.

Lizzie is looking over the clipboard as she holds a spiral, trying to rewrite it.

"I think this one looks good." Josie exclaims, pointing to the half speech she just took a break from.

"I don't know. This speech has to be perfect, moving but motivational, emotional yet not too cheesy. This just doesn't seem to be working." Lizzie tells Josie what the speech is supposed to have before grumpily turning the page in order to write another half speech.

After a few moments, Lizzie just sighs in frustration, closing the spiral then slamming it on the clipboard.

"Ughh, what am I even doing?" Lizzie asks in frustration as she stands up then turns face her twin, who looks at her sympathetically.

"I mean, I'm trying to write a speech in order to calm down a person who has way too many injuries and certainly not enough love. It's so severe, to the point where I'm not even sure if this dumb speech will work." Lizzie is getting angry so Josie starts calming her down.

"It's okay. I don't even think you need a speech. So, if don't want to write one, you don't have to." Josie assures her sister with a calming tone.

"I know, but I feel like I need to. I took her from her city and brought her to us, which got Landon taken. If I can talk her down from killing him long enough to have her hear my speech, and my apology, then I'd have fixed my mess." Lizzie looks upset and miserable by the fact they're chasing Hope via crime scenes, which is something else that she also feels guilty for, so Josie just comforts her in hug, letting her cry.

**(End of flashback)**

Josie then snaps back into reality and sighs sadly, missing her sister.

"Alright, there hasn't been another crime scene yet. How about we get another hotel and sleep?" Matt suggests and since they're all exhausted, physically and emotionally, they non-verbally agree to this plan by heading to Alaric's car to leave the scene.


	14. What She Left Behind, Not Her Creation

Two weeks have passed since Lizzie went missing and everybody just chooses not to mention her, not even Alaric, as Josie might pop the lid open on her emotions, which would most likely leave devastation in the wake of her emotional breakdown.

There have been multiple other crime scenes since Lizzie's abduction, so they're all just sitting around in a hotel room, waiting until someone calls them to inform them of a new one.

All of them are lazily lounging around, when all of a sudden, Josie perks up from lying on one of the beds.

"Oh my god. How did I not see it before?" Josie asks, it being obvious that she was just asking herself this question as she wasn't looking at anyone in particular when she said it.

Josie grabs the map of the US they kept from the crime scene Lizzie was abducted from and scans it over.

"Where are we?" Josie wonders looking around the room for an answer.

"Um, I think we're in Mississippi." MG replies sounding unsure of where they actually are.

"No, I'm pretty sure we're in Pennsylvania." Kaleb assumes sounding sleepy as well as unsure, like MG.

"Of course. It was right in front of my face and I almost completely missed it." Josie murmurs to herself as she takes a marker out of her pocket.

She mutters under her breath all of the crime scenes' locations that they've been to as she draws circles on the map.

"What do you guys notice about this map?" Josie questions once she's done and has held it up for the group to see.

"That you are ridiculously good at drawing geometrically perfect circles." Rafael points out with a nod causing Josie to look at the map, then slightly blush at the compliment.

"What else do you guys notice about the map?" Josie continues holding it up, as she looks around the room.

"We're going south." Alaric realizes and Josie nods at him in agreement.

"After we lost the talisman, I remembered the time that my sister thought that the speech wasn't going to work. She said that she took Hope from her city and brought her to us. I bet half of my savings account on the fact that she's going home." Josie exclaims, sounding happy for the first time in two weeks, yet no one brings up the fact that she didn't mention Lizzie's name even though she hesitated before mentioning her.

"So, what's the plan? She most likely hijacked all the phones in various police stations." Kaleb assumes, bringing up the plan she had with the Virginia state sheriff.

"I've got a better idea. We head to New Orleans, beating her there. We have a car, whereas she's on foot. It would take us a shorter amount of time than her." Josie reveals, this plan making sense when Rafael is struck with an idea.

"That's it." Rafael blurts randomly, catching everyone's attention.

"What's it?" MG looks for clarification from Rafael, who decides to do just that.

"At one of the previous crime scenes, you were all wondering why Hope took Landon. And I just figured that out." Rafael admits, revealing that he was watching, or maybe even following, them to each crime scene.

"Landon is literally a human compass. I might've been the werewolf but he was always the better one at tracking, even after I triggered my gene. The both of us have been to all fifty states and have explored every inch of the wilderness in each one. You said she's going home on foot? That might be it but the question we should ask ourselves is who'll get to New Orleans first because we may have a car, but Landon knows the shortcuts, along with your sister, who used backroads to get there and back." Rafael reveals an abundance of information that leaves them all shocked and curious.

"How do you know my sister used backroads to get to New Orleans?" Josie looks at him curiously.

"Landon's frenemies with her but he sees her as part of the pack, which lets me see her as someone needing protection. So, I watched over her when she was driving there and the month following her return." Rafael admits, leaving Josie seeming touched by this revelation.

"Well, that's great and all. It really is, but it doesn't entirely help us with where they are, now does it?" Penelope joins in on the conversation with a snarky remark, yet still liking and appreciative of the fact that Rafael has been watching over the school.

"Well, maybe I was a little too pushy in reverting me to normal. If I were still a wolf, I'd be tracking them." Rafael claims in realization.

"Well, you can't go back to being a wolf. I siphoned the ring's magic, it doesn't work anymore." Josie exclaims sadly.

"Not that I'd want to be. Unfortunately, I was probably the best way to track them without it being sensed, or obvious." Rafael seems to be hating the fact he can't be more help to them.

"Well, right now there's only one way and that's crime scenes. There's just been another one not far from where we are." Matt tells them as he walks back into the room, holding up his phone.

The group sighs in exasperation and head to the next crime scene, which is very different from the other ones, seeing as how there are two mutilated victims.

"She changed MOs." MG blatantly points out but Josie shakes her head.

"Only slightly. One brunette male in new clothes, one blonde female in new clothes. This is the first time that she killed two people in one go and it's obvious that she didn't bother posing them either." Josie exclaims motioning to the fact the bodies are lying on their backs.

"So, she's getting sloppy." Alaric assumes causing the rest of them to nod.

"She has two hostages now. If she's getting sloppy, then that means that she's getting angrier and therefore more dangerous." Penelope joins in on the conversation which worries both Josie and Rafael.

"There's no witness. Every other crime scene where a dead blonde is involved, there's always a scarf-wearing brunette." MG realizes as he looks around at the scene.

"Maybe that's because she has two victims?" Alaric suggests with a questioning tone, clearly concerned by the escalation of the crimes.

"It's still pretty close to civilization. Let's see if these cameras caught anything. If she's getting sloppy, it might mean that she's getting careless." Matt claims then the group head to the building that the crime scene is closest to in order to check the cameras.

"Alright. Let's see what happened." Matt murmurs as he accesses the cameras and once the footage is up, they all watch intently.

Landon is on the screen, holding Lizzie over his shoulders until he leans her up against a tree, where she seems to be unconscious yet has a gag in her mouth.

"Hey. Wake up." Landon whispers as he gently pats her face causing her to jerk awake.

"Mmm." Lizzie mumbles as she looks around until she spots Landon and she looks horrified, as she's about to scream.

"Shhh." Landon shushes her before she can scream.

"Okay, I'm going to remove this and you're going to be real quiet. Do you understand me?" Landon looks at Lizzie threateningly and she nods so Landon gently removes it.

"What the hell are you doing?" Lizzie wonders curiously as she whispers as well as silently cries.

"That's irrelevant. Look over there." Landon points to an area, that's most likely off-screen but Lizzie refuses.

"I said, look over there." Landon demands more threateningly, pulling a knife out of his pocket, as he roughly grips her hair causing her to silently sob and look where he wants her to.

"You're going to pick one for Hope to kill." Landon claims, still holding the knife to her neck.

"Which one do you want to be her victim?" Landon watches whoever's off-screen.

"The male one." Lizzie whimpers out as she continues to quietly sob.

"Great. Stay here, I'll go get her." Landon removes the knife from her neck, stands up, and walks away and Lizzie seems to notice the cameras, as she looks right at the screen.

"Follow the path she left behind, not the one she's creating. Succeed and I remain, fail and I shall rot. Follow the path she left behind, not the one she's creating." Lizzie talks to the camera in a low tone, repeating the message the girl at the campground passed to them before she looks away from the camera.

Landon comes back with Hope, who smiles devilishly at Lizzie after she crouches down in front of her.

"Oh, this is a show that you're definitely gonna want to see." Hope assures Lizzie as Landon, who Lizzie looks at desperately, leans against a tree that's behind Hope.

Only Josie can tell that Lizzie siphoned some magic from Hope when she turned to face Landon, who returns a devilish smirk.

"Well, let's go get our new victims." Hope declares then stands up and drags Landon over to where he wanted Lizzie to look earlier and Lizzie looks at the camera once more.

"Please help me." Lizzie whispers and mouths at the camera before raising her arms then snaps her fingers, shutting the footage off.

"Landon's gone completely rogue because of her." Penelope deduces but Rafael shakes his head.

"No, he looked at Lizzie with regret. And he also looked regretful when holding her at knife point. The only bad thing; if he's acting that way, that means his survival instincts have kicked in. Basically, he'll do whatever Hope wants of him if it means keeping himself alive." Rafael reveals yet backtracks when Josie looks horrified by this revelation.

"Yet, it's obvious that he has an interest in keeping Lizzie alive as well. If he didn't, he would've killed her, had Hope requested it." Rafael reassures Josie trying to ease her and Alaric's fears, which have some impact but only enough to slightly calm them down.

"Follow the path she left behind, not the one she's creating." MG repeats the words Lizzie did on the footage, seemingly angry at these words.

"What the hell does that even mean?" Josie questions, clearly pissed off by Hope's games.

"She took Lizzie thinking that she'd be taken seriously. Hope's not messing around anymore and Lizzie wants us to know that. Which is why she repeated the message twice, she wants us to stop hunting the crime scenes." MG deduces and Penelope sighs clearly annoyed.

"Well, it appears I was unaware that she was playing nice." Penelope remarks snarkily as she rolls her eyes in annoyance at MG's deduction.

"Not now Penelope." Josie retorts with her own eye roll at Penelope's snarky remark.

"I have an idea." Rafael blurts randomly, having everyone look at him.

"Okay." Alaric looks at him expectantly, along with the rest of the room.

"Hope doesn't know Matt's with us, that gives us an in. While we stay in a hotel, trying to figure out the message Lizzie left us, we have the sheriff follow the cases alone? Like I said, Hope doesn't even know who he is, let alone that he's a member of our group." Rafael reminds them of his previous statement after giving a pretty great suggestion.

"But, what if he ends up dead?" MG wonders and Josie shakes her head.

"No, the sheriff looks like her female victims yet is a male. Blonde females and brunette males are her victim type. She's too controlled to stray from that path, her two victims outside prove that." Josie exclaims, assuring MG that Matt's perfectly safe.

"That's actually a really good idea. She only cares about us following her, but she wouldn't care if only one person, she doesn't even know is apart of our group, is investigating." Kaleb speaks up, reminding everybody that he's there too.

"Alright, let's go and head back to our hotel." Alaric advises so the rest of the group, except Matt, follow Ric to his car and head back to the hotel they recently left.


	15. You Only Know it When it Hits You

The group head back to their hotel to think about Lizzie's words yet Josie looks haunted by the terrified look she gave the camera when she said the words 'please help me'.

"Succeed and I remain, fail and I shall rot. Follow the path she left behind, not the one she's creating." MG appears to have that message on a loop in his mind as there would be no other reason why he'd be repeating it.

"She could've told us anything, passed any message, but she chose those words. Why?" MG murmurs to himself as he paces back and forth in the room.

"You said that Hope wants to be taken seriously and that we have to stop hunting crime scenes." Penelope reminds MG of his own words, which he nods at.

"Yeah I know. I just feel like there's more to it than that." MG reveals his belief that Lizzie's message meant something other than what he said at the crime scene and it's obvious that the words are still nagging at him because of this belief.

"Please help me. Those were the last words she said before she shut off the camera. I mean, if MG's right about what he said at the crime scene then why would she ask us to help her?" Josie's tone is frantic and she looks like she's going to explode with anger and confusion.

"I'm calling Dorian. Maybe he can help." Alaric suggests then calls his friend, who answers almost immediately.

"I'm so glad that you called. Well, actually I was just about to call you, so it doesn't really matter." Dorian sounds hyped on everything.

"Dorian, did you get any sleep?" Alaric wonders sounding concerned.

"I took a twenty minute nap after you told me to get rest. But right now, mmm, I am hyped on caffeine." Alaric could hear Dorian take a sip of, probably coffee, before saying he was hyped on caffeine.

"You said you were going to call." Alaric reminds his caffeine-hyped companion.

"Right. Um, I haven't heard from you in a while and wanted to check in. Is everything alright?" Dorian sounds concerned even when he's on caffeine-overload.

"No. Hope took one of our own as a way to pass a message. That's actually why I called. Now, does the saying 'follow the path she left behind, not the one she's creating' sound familiar to you in anyway?" Alaric asks and Dorian starts thinking about.

"No, nothing. Why, is it like a book quote, or something?" Dorian questions, confused and seemingly calmer.

"No, it's a message that Hope passed on to us and I was wondering if you could help us figure it out." Alaric shares his thoughts with Dorian.

"I'll think about it. But you should know that's a very vague saying." Dorian admits and Alaric nods in agreement.

"Yeah, I know." Alaric agrees then ends the call, never telling Dorian who was taken.

"He's never remotely heard anything close to it but he said he'll think about." Alaric informs the group of the phone call.

"Oh my god. I just realized something." Josie looks and sounds horrified by her own thoughts, which catches everyone's attention.

"What is it?" Penelope wonders, sounding concerned.

"Lizzie fits Hope's female victim type. What if she kills her?" Josie looks upset by this revelation and the rest of the room has no ideas on how to answer that.

"No, no Landon won't let that happen. Like I said before, he sees your sister as part of his pack, he wouldn't let anything happen to her, even if he's in survival mode." Rafael reassures Josie, who's still upset but seems comforted by his words.

"I really pray your right." Alaric claims and Rafael nods at him.

"Trust me, I know my brother better than anybody. He won't let her die." Rafael assures Alaric, who seems pleased to hear this.

A few hours later, it's nightfall and MG is still pacing back and forth while everyone else tries to sleep, but can't because of his pacing.

"Damn it Milton. Go to sleep!" Penelope demands loudly, clearly exhausted from the day.

"Okay." MG lies on the blow-up mattress next to her and finally closes his eyes to sleep.

Sometime later, in the middle of the night, Josie's tossing and turning, unable to get comfortable.

She lies on her back, and huffs in annoyance at her inability to sleep then closes her eyes to try again but instead she gets struck with a realization that she can't believe she almost entirely missed.

"Oh my god. I figured it out." Josie sighs out in realization with a smile, happy with herself.


	16. Disturbing Revelations

Josie sits up in bed, grabs a pillow, and throws it at her dad, who's sleeping on the other hotel bed.

"Dad. Wake up." Josie whispers grabbing another pillow and throwing it at his face.

"What?" Alaric sits up sleepy and confused as he looks at Josie, who's smiling happily.

"I figured it out." Josie exclaims in a whisper but it doesn't register with Ric's mind yet as he's still half-asleep.

"That's great, sweetie. Get some sleep." Alaric advises sleepily then lays back down, keeping the two pillows she threw at him.

Josie sighs then gets out of bed and crawls on Penelope's blow-up mattress that she shares with MG.

"Guys, wake up." Josie nudges Penelope, who slowly starts to stir awake which causes MG to wake up as well.

"Guys, I figured it out." Josie exclaims once more which causes MG and Penelope to shoot awake.

"Figured what out?" Kaleb wakes up with a yawn before he crawls over to the 'party' on Penelope's mattress.

"The message. Follow the path she left behind not the one she's creating. I know what it means, I know what that path is." Josie reveals happily causing them all to look at her in wonder.

"How? When?" Penelope asks, still in awe that Josie figured it out.

"Not long ago. I just closed my eyes after trying to sleep, and then it just hit me like a metaphorical wrecking ball." Josie looks very excited, like happiness is consuming her.

"Okay. Are you going to tell us?" MG wonders but Josie shakes her head.

"No, I can't. We need to get to New Orleans. Whether Hope's there or not." Josie claims and they all nod at her.

"Well, I know how to drive. We could just leave him here." Penelope suggests as she motions to the headmaster, who's still sleeping.

"No, I don't want to leave my dad unattended." Josie states as she shakes her head at this suggestion.

"We could always leave a note. Besides, like the sheriff, he's not on Hope's victimology radar making him safe." Kaleb assures Josie, who nods in understanding when there's movement.

"What are you guys talking about?" Rafael stretches before joining the rest of the group.

"Josie figured out Hope's message. Now, we're making plans to leave for New Orleans." MG informs Rafael, who yawns and nods.

"Sounds fun. When do we leave?" Rafael wonders curiously.

"We're thinking now. But Josie doesn't want to leave the headmaster behind." Penelope says looking at Josie, who frowns.

"Maybe we can wake him up enough so he can get in the car?" Rafael suggests but Josie shakes her head.

"I've got a better idea." Josie claims, smirking deviously before walking over to her dad's bed.

"Dad, wake up. I'm hungry." Josie admits as she nudges her dad, who wakes up, he seems more awake then he was when she threw pillows at him, but he still seems sleepy.

"Hmm? Josie, it's three o'clock in the morning." Alaric sighs as he looks at the digital clock in the room.

"I know, but we realized that we never had dinner." Josie points out, so Alaric looks at the rest of his students, seeing them all holding their stomachs as though they're hungry.

Alaric sighs in mild annoyance but then his phone goes off, so he answers it.

"Hello?" Alaric still sounds sleepy as he yawns his greeting.

"Hey, sorry to wake you. Um, we just got another crime scene just outside the border of Louisiana and I don't even know how to profile it." Matt explains, sounding disturbed which has Ric sit up.

"What do you mean?" Alaric seems concerned which gets the rest of them concerned as well.

"The crime scene guys don't know if they should be here or if an exorcist should be. It's nothing like the other crime scenes, I can tell you that much." Matt claims, this making Ric worried.

"Does the victim look like a hostage?" Alaric asks, clearly worried and concerned, as well as more awake.

"No, none of them look like Lizzie and Landon. But an entire diner was mutilated and slaughtered in way I honestly thought I'd never see again. Hope's getting sloppy, careless, and even more dangerous than she was before. This is a downward spiral that I don't think she can be brought back from." Matt's tone seems worried but Alaric sighed in relief when he said none of the victims looked like Lizzie, or Landon.

"Alright. Keep me posted." Alaric advises as he runs a hand through his hair.

"Yeah, I will." Matt assures him then ends the call and Alaric puts his cell phone on the nightstand.

"That was Matt. Apparently Hope is spiraling downward very fast. She just mutilated and slaughtered an entire diner. None of the victims were Lizzie or Landon." Alaric explains making them horrified and relieved at the same time.

"Were there any children in the diner?" Josie wonders which Alaric nods at.

"Yeah, but they were in the back, unharmed and didn't seem traumatized in any way." Alaric reveals which confuses Penelope.

"That doesn't make any sense. She's spiraling downward, she would've harmed the kids as well." Penelope believes but MG shakes his head.

"Unless, the kids were already in the back before she entered. According to the footage at the last crime scene we were at, it's obvious that Hope is using Landon and Lizzie, to scope out victims. It's possible that they put all the kids in the back before they got Hope involved." MG makes a good point of reassurance to them.

"So, you guys want food at three o' clock in the morning?" Alaric wonders curiously, and they all nod but this is no longer an excuse to drive them to New Orleans as their stomachs rumble.

"Alright. Note-to-self; never go to bed hungry, or else your students will wake you up at three in the morning for food." Alaric murmurs under his breath as he gets up and heads to the bathroom.

When he walks out, the rest of the students are in street clothes, clearly waiting for him.

"Did the sheriff say where the crime scene was?" Kaleb questions, clearly curious.

"Yeah, just outside the border of Louisiana. Why?" Alaric looks suspicious of the question but Josie realizes what this means.

"If she's that close to her state, then it won't be long before she's in New Orleans. Which means that there will be no more crime scenes." Josie deduces but Kaleb's confused by the horror in Josie's voice.

"I don't understand. No more crime scenes are good, aren't they?" Kaleb voices his confusion but Josie just shakes her head.

"No, Kaleb. No more crime scenes are very bad. She only took Landon so she can get to her destination, she took Lizzie so we'd listen to her and for assistance in getting home. If she's near, or already at, her destination then she'll most likely find no reason to her hostages alive anymore. We need to get their now more than ever." Josie is frantic and is clearly on the verge of freak out attack as she hyperventilates while she says this and Kaleb kind of wished he didn't say anything at all.

"After we eat, right?" MG pipes up, causing them to realize they're all still hungry.

Josie calms herself down with help from Penelope then they all leave for Alaric's car to get food and head to New Orleans afterwards.

Once they're outside of New Orleans, Alaric stops the car, looking uncertain of entering, but then again they all do.

"We should walk from here. Or else she'll know we're here." Rafael advises, so Ric turns off his car and they all get out of it.

"This place is hella creepy." MG states as they all step foot in the border of the former glorious and thriving city.

"Lizzie came here by herself not knowing the consequences, or existance of Hope. We are a group and have that knowledge, we've totally got this." Josie says confidently as she leads the group through the city.

"Where are we even going?" Penelope wonders, as they look around at the horror the city has become.

"How about Rousseau's?" Rafael suggests, pronouncing it all wrong as, row-see-awes, as he points to the sign.

"That doesn't sound right. But okay." Josie claims skeptically as they head towards it.

They open the door, only to immediately see a badly beaten and unconscious Lizzie, who Josie rushes to, only to be stopped by a voice.

"You're here. Which means, you figured it out. I guess the question is, were you too late?" Hope's voice echoes the empty restaurant and Landon appears behind Lizzie, yanking her hair back then holding a knife to her throat.

"Show yourself!" Josie demands, her tone implies that she is very pissed with Hope, who acknowledges this and steps out of the shadows.

"You have two options. One; you tell me what you figured out, and they live. Two; don't tell me what you've figured out, and well, they die." Hope gives Josie an ultimatum that she doesn't like at all.

"What happens if I give you an ultimatum?" Josie wonders, asking this clearly out of curiosity.

"Landon." Hope calls out to him, and just as Josie thinks he's going to kill Lizzie, he holds the knife up to his own throat, clearly waiting on her word to kill himself.

"You were saying?" Hope mocks Josie as she tilts her head cutely and smiles while pointing to the scene that's behind her.

"Okay, you win." Josie states, sounding defeated and Hope smiles more broadly at these words while Josie frowns.

"I figured out that you're killing the blondes because they were there, in the science facilities that tested on you. The brunettes you fed on were symbols of the people who observed your behavior, yet did nothing to help. That's why you didn't kill them, but you had them witness the murders, as you were watched while being tested on, then compelled them to forget." Josie explains, this confession being right as it gets Hope mildly emotional.

"And the men?" Hope's voice is confident even though it seems like she wants to fall apart.

"I don't know. I assume the men resemble someone that you know, or knew, that you hated, or something. You completely mutilated the bodies post-mortem, having killed them via draining of blood. When they didn't look like the guy you were looking for as a corpse, you mutilated the bodies in anger and frustration then moved on in order to get it right. Never being able to do so, you slaughtered an entire diner." Josie gives her the explanation of why she killed the men, causing Hope to look impressed yet also shocked.

"Well, I'll admit you are a very smart girl and since you managed to profile me, I'll show a sign of good faith." Hope claims then turns behind her.

"Landon, drop the knife. Your getting a reprieve, go stand over there." Hope demands, pointing to Rafael, after shouting back at Landon then said the second statement looking at Josie, who sighs in relief at this, while she continues to stare at her intently.

Landon obliges to this demand, drops the knife, and heads to Rafael, who is also relieved at this sign of good faith.

Hope turns around and starts to walk over to Lizzie before stopping to turn back to Josie.

"Also, you're wrong. I never killed an entire diner." Hope admits, shocking them.

"You had to of, your signature mutilation and slaughtering was at the diner, just outside the border of Louisiana." Alaric reveals and this information clearly shocks Hope, which you can tell just by her facial expression.

"No, that's not right. I used backroads and shortcuts through the woods. I never even crossed paths with a diner. Landon can agree to this." Hope's starting to sound frantic and Landon nods in agreement.

"She's right. I lead her through the shortcuts to get here. We've been here for the past three hours." Landon informs the group, clearing Hope's name.

"Well, if you didn't kill the entire diner then who the hell did?" Penelope speaks up with an annoyed tone yet it's obvious none of them know.

"Wait, Josie said you were looking for someone with every male victim that you killed. What if the person you're looking for was tracking you the way we were? That's why you couldn't find the right person because the person you were hunting was hunting you." MG appears to have made a break-through after making a suggestion, that makes a lot of sense.

"If that's the case, then…" Josie trails off when she sees that Hope has zoned out.

Hope gets flashes of darkness, like she's in a pit of it, as she screams for help, looking around desperately for it in that darkness.

Hope then blinks and shakes her head when her name was being repeated by Landon.

"Hope, you good? You totally zoned out again." Landon points out, implying that what she just did wasn't the first time that it happened.

"Yeah, I'm good. It's nothing." Hope lies with a reassuring tone but Landon still looks skeptical.

All of a sudden, before Landon can press Hope on what happened, they hear a loud noise, which wakes up Lizzie, who Josie runs to.

"Lizzie, you're okay. Oh, you're okay." Josie hugs her sister after untying her and Lizzie, weak as she is, manages to return the hug while Josie lifts her up.

"What the hell is that?" Hope demands as she rushes towards the window, only to see the headlights of a car and Penelope sees them too.

"Ohh, hit the deck!" Penelope shouts before grabbing Hope as she jumps away from the window.

The car crashes right through the window, revealing that it's Alaric's car.

"Dr. S? Isn't that your car?" Kaleb wonders pointing to the vehicle while they all recover from the incident and dust the glass off of them.

MG runs over to Josie, who's near an even more badly injured, unconscious Lizzie, and he looks at Josie, who nods back at him before going she passes out.

With this approval, MG bites his wrist to give Lizzie his blood, and though it takes a few minutes, she eventually starts responding to his blood.

MG removes his wrist then he lifts her up where she immediately rushes to Josie, who's unconscious, even though she was going to rush to her father until she saw that her twin was passed out.

Lizzie flips Josie on her back, then looks at MG desperately, so he feeds Josie his blood as well, with her responding to it.

Landon rushes over to Hope and Penelope to ensure that they're okay.

"You guys alright?" Landon wonders as he helps both of them and they nod at him, but it doesn't take long before Penelope rushes over to check on Josie.

Once the non-vampires are okay and uninjured, they head outside to see what, or who caused the crash, only to see an army of obvious humans.

Landon pulls Hope back inside the building and abruptly kisses her, which she reciprocates.

"What was that for?" Hope questions once the kiss breaks.

"There's an entire army out there and I have no actual fighting experience. So I figured, if I die, then might as well have a last kiss kind of thing." Landon explains so Hope smiles.

Then they head back out to the army of humans, preparing for a fight.

"Any of you remember my defense lessons?" Alaric wonders, and they all nod.

"Yeah, but you gave us the rule 'don't feed on or kill humans'." MG points out, reminding Ric of the rule he gave them.

"Are you really applying that rule right now, Milton?" Penelope asks as she get into a fighting position.

"I'm not applying the rule, I just thought I'd mention it." MG admits causing them all to roll their eyes.

"Yeah, well luckily that rule never applied to me." Hope flaunts before vamp speeding to a human, feeding on them then breaking their neck.

All of them start fighting and killing the humans, who started charging at them after Hope killed a member.

The fight goes on for a while, when a man, who fits the description of the men Hope had been killing, appears on top of a car, not that anyone initially notices as they're all too busy fighting.

Josie seems to notice the guy while being pressed against a wall in chokehold and can see that he's holding a spear.

Josie fights the guy off, eventually killing him, when she realizes that the man is aiming for Lizzie.

"Lizzie!" Josie shouts as she makes her way, running towards her twin.

"Lizzie, look out!" Josie yells again and Lizzie looks at her, confused.

"For what?" Lizzie asks then turns where Josie is point, only to stop like a deer in headlights, seeing a spear flying towards her.

Hope, upon hearing this commotion, vamp speeds in front of a petrified Lizzie, raises her hands and casts a barrier spell around the both of them as a form of protection.

However, the spear proves that the spell is nothing as it goes through it, being covered in mud.

Hope starts gasping and sputtering up blood, causing Josie to stop in her tracks seeing that Hope was impaled with it.

Her hands go to her sides as the spell around her falls and she drops to her knees then goes over on her side causing Lizzie to place her on her back, with her head in her lap.

"That was aiming for my stomach, you dumbass." Lizzie scolds Hope for her actions after a rush of air flows through all of them.

The rest of the humans just drop dead and the person who was responsible for injuring Hope is gone but everyone's too focused on Hope to care.

Hope keeps sputtering up blood as the spear just grazed her heart yet through her ribcage until stops.

"I remember. Malivore." Hope breathes out then looks at Josie with a smile.

"Good to know that you're alive." Hope states before coughing up blood again.

It appears that they all remember her again and she seems to remember them, as her mind was possibly altered since she didn't recognize their faces even though their memories were the ones wiped, not hers.

**(Flashback)**

Hope and Landon are embracing when they hear footsteps and a voice.

"Well, aren't you two adorable." Ryan Clarke appears causing to turn and Landon to look up.

"I didn't mean to interrupt." Ryan claims, putting his hands up in a non-threatening manner since Hope looked like she was going to cast a spell.

"I do wonder how sad it would be if your new boyfriend took part in raising our father. I mean he needs one last life to become mortal. I think Landon would make a perfect offering." Ryan taunts them and Hope scoffs after kissing Landon.

"Well, I know something you don't. Malivore needs a living being." Hope starts then breaks Landon's neck with no forewarning, shocking Ryan.

"Which he no longer is." Hope states motioning to Landon's now dead body causing Ryan to step closer to her.

Hope puts her hand up placing a simple barrier spell between her and Ryan while she makes a phone call.

"Hey Dr. Saltzman. I'm going to need a favor, take everything you have on me, including the file you thought I didn't know about along with Landon's journal that he keeps of me and burn it all. Have maintenance pack up my dorm room because I'm not going to be returning for a while. How is she?" Hope wonders after telling him the favor she needs, making Ryan curious.

"Okay, bye." Hope hangs up, looking upset, as she wipes some tears from her eyes, which causes her barrier spell to fall and Ryan to smirk.

"Barrier's down." Ryan points out but before Hope can retaliate, he grabs her and slams her into a metal pillar from the building they're in.

"Ughh." Hope grunts in pain from having her head slammed into the pillar, then Ryan clasps his hand around her throat, making it hard for her to focus on any spells as his grip on her neck gets tighter.

"I'm going to have so much fun killing you." Ryan remarks sounding happy as he continues suffocates her.

Hope glances over at Landon's body then looks over the edge of where they're standing, noticing that Malivore opened, then thinks of what Alaric told her.

'_Uh, I don't know. When I showed up, she was suffering from severe hallucinations. I gave the vial of your blood to Lizzie but it remains unknown if she could give it to Josie.'_

Alaric's message of Josie's health echoed through her mind as she looked at the pit then she looks back up, realizing what she has to do.

"I'm sure you will. But I have a better idea." Hope manages to tell him in between her gasps for breath.

Before Ryan can even process, or wonder what it is, Hope breaks his wrist that's around her throat then grasps his shoulders along with some of his jacket.

"We die together." Hope exclaims and jumps into Malivore, bringing Ryan Clarke down with her, causing Malivore to close indefinitely.

**(End of flashback)**

Hope lies there, head in Lizzie's lap, sputtering up blood before going unconscious, causing some of them, mainly Josie and Lizzie, to start crying over her body.


	17. She's Dead!

The group heads back to the school using the backroads Lizzie took, with Hope's body, unable to leave it in New Orleans.

"What are we going to do?" MG asks quietly, not actually having an answer and knowing that nobody else does either.

"Hey, you guys are back. What happ…" Emma stops in her tracks to see Hope's body and everyone looking distraught about it.

Emma seems at a loss of words, not knowing what to say so she just joins them sitting in silence.

They eventually put Hope's body in a coffin that they leave in the library yet make no moves or plans for a funeral service.

School goes on as though she isn't even there, as no one mentions her, no one enters the library, and everyone just focuses on their schoolwork.

A month after the events of all the crime scenes and Hope's death, Josie is sitting on her bed in her and Lizzie's dorm room, apparently having started to drink whiskey during the month following Hope's death.

Lizzie enters the dorm room, appalled to see Josie openly pouring a flask into her soda with no form of measuring.

"What are you doing?" Lizzie wonders in a soft tone, seeing that Josie is pretty on edge.

"You know, I never understood why people drank but it's actually really therapeutic. Especially with the saying, 'drown your sorrows'." Josie chuckles darkly after saying drown your sorrows then continues to drink from flask, disregarding the fact that she just spiked the drink in her hand.

"I know that you're upset about Ho- her death but…" Lizzie starts yet Josie cuts her off, in a rude fashion, symbolizing that Hope's death is what caused her to pop the top on her emotions.

"But what? I need to focus on controlling your emotions and freak outs. I've spent so much time taking care of you, not caring about anything else but what you were doing." Josie starts to rant and continues to do so, cutting Lizzie off from talking when she was about to intercept.

"The time for that is over Lizzie. Starting now, I'm going to take care of myself, focus on my own emotions because I am done. I am so done taking care of you. I-I…" Josie trails off as she starts to hyperventilate before taking a sip of her flask, which doesn't help her at all.

"Josie…" Lizzie doesn't know what to say yet feels intimidated when Josie glares at her, the hyperventilating having lowered.

"This is your fault. Hope is dead because of you." Josie blames Lizzie, who feels tears start to form in her eyes.

"You just stood there, not moving at all. You were like a deer in headlights, causing Hope to interfere and get killed." Josie accuses Lizzie in a very angry tone.

"I didn't know Hope was going to interfere." Lizzie tries to defend herself but Josie scoffs at this.

"You want me to be okay with that. 'You didn't know'. Well, that's the problem Lizzie, you never know because you never think. Your attitude is what gets you into trouble, you say all the wrong things, then wonder what went wrong. You are an act first, think later kind of person and I'm sick of it." Josie is frantic, trying not to cry as she reprimands Lizzie for everything causing Lizzie to look up to ensure her tears won't fall.

"Jos…" Lizzie starts before Josie just throws her glass against the wall, breaking and splashing the contents everywhere which makes Lizzie jump nervously.

"You don't understand, she's dead! Do you hear me?! She's dead! She-she's dead. " Josie yells at Lizzie before coming to terms with it then starts crying hysterically and although being angry at her, she doesn't stop Lizzie from consoling and comforting her in a hug, letting her cry.

"I know. I-I'm sorry. I really am." Lizzie apologizes to Josie as she comforts her in a hug while her sister continues to hysterically cry over the loss of Hope.

Lizzie had no idea how much Hope meant to Josie until this moment and all she can think about is how Josie was right, she was an act/talk first, think later person as well as also being responsible for Hope, although she didn't know why she couldn't bring herself to move but she just couldn't, not like Josie would ever be okay with that kind of blasphemous excuse.

Josie is now lying on her bed, having cried herself to sleep, while Lizzie watches over her and cleans up the mess Josie made when she threw the glass against the wall but Lizzie couldn't find all of the glass pieces.

'Hmm, oh well. If one of us walks to this area barefoot, or with socks, and there's still glass, we will be figuring it out a lot sooner rather than later.' Lizzie thinks then shrugs, walking off to the garbage can in the room in order to throw out the broken glass she had managed to collect.

Afterwards, Lizzie looks at a sleeping Josie sadly, before walking out of the room and heading to the library, where she's shocked to see Penelope, Rafael, MG, Landon, and Kaleb all there, drinking beer.

"What are you all doing in here?" Lizzie wonders curiously.

"Paying our respects to a fallen friend and good member of the school's community." MG responds before saluting his beer bottle in the direction of Hope's coffin and then takes a sip.

"Mind if I join? I need to take some edge off." Lizzie claims and Kaleb just hands her an un-open beer bottle which she grabs then takes the lid off with her teeth before taking a long swig of it.

Lizzie coughs a bit after taking a sip, looking revolted.

"Ughh, that's kind of disgusting." Lizzie states, looking at the beer bottle, revolted.

"You've never had beer before?" Penelope looks at Lizzie questioningly and Lizzie shakes her head, agreeing that she hasn't.

"But I'll take what I can get, if it takes the edge off." Lizzie continues to drink from the bottle.

"Guys. It might be the beer talking, or metaphorical train just hit me, but something feels off." MG explains his worries, catching everyone's attention.


	18. Surprising Details

Before anyone can ask MG what feels off, the library door opens and Josie, whose eyes are still damp and red from crying, walks in.

"You guys are having a mourning party and didn't invite me?" Josie's voice is calm while her facial expression is appalled at the sight of her friends, including Lizzie, are drinking without her.

"By all means, join the party." Penelope exclaims, holding her arms out in a welcoming manner before grabbing an un-open beer bottle, handing to Josie, who walks over to grab it.

It's obvious by Penelope's tone of voice that she's at least tipsy, implying that she was most likely the first one there or she just has a lower alcohol tolerance than the others, who don't sound drunk or tipsy at all, except maybe Landon, who looks pretty drunk too.

After a while of drinking in the library, Penelope decides to start a conversation.

"MG claims he has a weird feeling." Penelope drunkenly blurts out, having them all look to MG.

"It wasn't a weird feeling. It's just, something felt off, I don't know, I can't place it. Probably just the alcohol speaking." MG assumes then takes another swig of beer, right when the headmaster comes in, looking appalled at the sight of daughters and some other students drinking.

All of the minors sit there awkwardly, holding their beer bottles as the headmaster stares at them in disbelief.

"Uh, this is prop beer." Landon makes an excuse but his tone of voice says drunk and this causes the rest of them to glare at him.

An hour later, Alaric has them all drinking water in order to sober up before he scolds and reprimands them.

"Um, guys. That wasn't open before." Rafael points out as he motions to Hope's now open coffin.

"Aw, hell no. I refuse to stay in a school or library that has a ghost haunting it. See ya." Kaleb salutes them farewell and is about to walk out when Penelope grabs the back of his shirt.

"It's not a ghost." Penelope claims as she slams Kaleb back on his seat.

"She's right. This is magic." Lizzie deduces confidently as she turns back to face the group, agreeing with Penelope.

"Magic leaves behind an aura when any spell is done. Ghosts don't leave traces of anything. Besides, if there were a ghost in our midsts, the temperature would've dropped immensely." Lizzie adds after clarifying the difference between magic and ghosts.

"So we're dealing with an invisible witch?" MG looks at Lizzie curiously yet this gets Lizzie thinking.

"No, not an invisible witch. An unconscious one." Lizzie reveals as she looks at Hope's body curiously.

"How is that even possible? We were all there when she died." Landon points out and Rafael shakes his head as he pulls out a spiral.

"Well, actually it is possible. I interrogated one of each species and each of them said that, if in any life or death situation were to occur to that species, they are capable of putting themselves in their own minds. So even if the body's dead their soul lives on in their heads." Rafael explains after reading his spiral, quoting it.

"It also explains why she hasn't turned gray like vampires do when they die." Rafael motions to the fact Hope is, in fact, normal skin color unlike a dead vampire.

"Well, how do we fix it?" Josie asks looking at Rafael curiously as he skims through his spiral.

"That's the difficult part. It depends on who it is and how old they are, especially when it comes to vampires. She can be in any memory over the course of her nearly twenty years of living. Although, I will admit, she could be a centuries old vampire with a lot more memories than she does now." Rafael exclaims, pointing out the only positive that the current situation has.

"Okay, we'll enter her mind, find her, and get her out." Penelope states plainly but Rafael shakes his head.

"You can't just pull her out. Her body is still dead, so if you do that, she'll just actually be dead. You have to find her and stay with her until her body is healed." Rafael explains and they all look stumped with this new information.

"How about we send two people in, one stays with Hope while the other comes back in order to inform us when to heal the body." Josie suggests and Rafael nods at this.

"That would work. The only question is, who knows the spell to enter her mind?" Rafael questions suspiciously.

"Oh, I know that spell." Lizzie admits, shocking Josie, who looks at her along with the rest of the room.

"You do?" Josie looks at her, shocked that she didn't know that and also that she doesn't know the spell.

"Yep, but there's a problem. I need one of her relatives to do it. Now if I were sending only myself in, that's one thing but sending two people in, I'd need a battery source that's blood related." Lizzie reveals the problem that they have.

"So, what you're saying is that you need an original vampire?" Landon wonders, his tone questioning and Lizzie nods at him in agreement.

"Well, luckily for you, I happen to have two on speed dial and I'm praying that one of them would be willing to help." Alaric exclaims happily as he pulls out his phone to make a phone call.


	19. Old Faces in New-ish Memories

"Hey, Rebekah. This is Alaric Saltzman." Alaric mentions himself after greeting her once she picks up the phone.

"Why are you calling?" Rebekah asks, sounding suspicious of the call.

"Um, I found myself in a bit of a predicament and I need your assistance." Alaric claims which confuses Rebekah.

"What happened that you needed to call me?" Rebekah wonders, curiously.

"Well, I tried calling Kol but it went to voicemail. It's about Hope." Alaric gets to the point after claiming he called Kol before her, yet this gets her worried.

"What about Hope? Is she okay?" Rebekah interrogates, officially worried.

"She will be. I just need you to come to the school in order to help with a life-saving spell." Alaric explains, somewhat reassuring Rebekah that Hope's okay.

"Oh yeah. Of course, just let me hop on a plane and I'll be there as soon as I can." Rebekah exclaims, sounding mildly frantic then ends the call.

"So, her aunt is on her way now. But she has to take a plane to get here though." Alaric informs the group, who seem relieved to hear that a relative is on the way.

"Well, I can try to search her mind for her while we wait." Lizzie suggests but Josie seems hesitant.

"Lizzie, you still need magic to do the spell. Maybe someone else can do it." Josie assumes but Lizzie shakes her head.

"I'm the only person in the room who knows the spell. Therefore, I'm the only person who can do it." Lizzie claims then walks over to MG, who lets her siphon magic from him.

"Alright, let's do this." Lizzie murmurs to herself after she sets up what's needed for the spell.

She lies down in the salt circle that she made on the floor then chants the spell until she goes unconscious with everyone watching over her.

Lizzie wakes up, standing in a white hallway, she stares down the hallway with a bunch of wooden doors, gulping nervously at it as she feels mildly intimidated by the hall.

She gets over it and starts cautiously walking down the hallway, looking at each door she passes.

"Come on Hope, where are you?" Lizzie continues walking down the hallway, still slightly nervous.

Meanwhile, the rest of the group sit around, waiting for Lizzie to return, anxiously.

Josie is just outside the circle, watching Lizzie intently, afraid that her sister could get lost along with Hope inside her mind.

Lizzie's still walking down the hallway, coming across a door with a butterfly shaped hook on it.

Officially curious, she opens the door only to be standing near woods and sees a house in the distance.

Then she sees Hope, looking much younger, holding hands and walking with a blonde male, who's kind of attractive if Lizzie's being honest.

"I can't always control it so well. It scares me sometimes." Hope admits as the two walk and then they stop so the guy can crouch to her eye level.

"You, love, are the daughter of Klaus Mikaelson. You're going to be the strongest witch the world has ever seen. Nothing will scare you." the guy assures her and she smiles at him.

"I know what you are, you know. The strongest in the world. Strong enough to keep all of the bad things away." Hope points out and the man frowns at her second statement.

"What bad things?" the guy wonders, seeming worried.

"Just bad guys. Monsters. People who are mean, selfish, and angry." Hope clarifies and the man smiles at her once more.

"Nothing is going to harm my little girl. Nothing will even get close. You're all that matters to me." the guy states and Hope hugs him, which he's shocked by before he hugs back.

"That must be her father." Lizzie assumes then looks over at Hope.

"Hope, it's Lizzie. Hope." Lizzie tries to get her attention but Klaus just picks her up and walks back to the house, so Lizzie leaves the memory.

She keeps walking down the hallway until sees another door that catches her eye, so she enters the memory.

Now Lizzie finds herself in the compound, where Hope is painting a picture, when she senses something.

"I know you're there." Hope says plainly causing her dad to look into her room and she turns to face him.

"I didn't want to bother you." Klaus claims kind of sheepishly.

"You can just interrupt. Helicopter parenting isn't really your style." Hope accuses him.

"Uh, here. It won't stop what it's doing to you but it might help." Klaus hands her her old bracelet.

"I don't need that. I can handle this." Hope assures him but he shakes his head.

"No, you can't. Not with this. Listen Hope, I've had one fourth of the Hollow in me and the urges I had when I was in some near distance with my sibling was unbearable. You have all of it in you." Klaus explains making Hope gulp nervously before speaking.

"Um, okay. If I put that on, will promise to stop worrying about me?" Hope wonders but Klaus looks uneasy.

"I'm your father. I'm always gonna worry." Klaus claims, assuringly.

Hope lets him put the bracelet on her wrist.

"There, happy? Or were planning on hovering over me till the end of time?" Hope's tone is teasing as chuckles at this.

"Well, end of time is a bit extreme." Klaus' tone is also teasing as he looks at the ceiling, yet his voice seems to have some seriousness in it.

Hope smiles at him then kisses him on the cheek.

"Thank you." Hope thanks him as she looks grateful while he smiles then he leaves the room.

"Hope. Wake up, it's me, Lizzie." Lizzie tries to get Hope to see her but she just gets out of the memory when it has no effect.

Lizzie walks further down the hallway, yet another door catching her interest, so she enters this memory.

Hope's a child again but this time she's with an adult brunette female.

"Okay, grandma Mary is going to be watching over until I return." the woman assures Hope, who still looks skeptical.

"Don't go mommy. I don't want you to be alone." Hope claims as she hugs her mother.

"I'll be fine, sweetie, I promise. Besides, I'm not alone." Hayley states after the hug breaks and Hope smiles at her.

"Promise?" Hope wonders curiously, still not wanting her mother to leave.

"Promise." Hayley kisses her index and middle finger then puts out to Hope, who does the same and their fingers lock as they smile at each other.

"Why don't you head on inside while I talk to your mother." Mary suggests so Hope skips inside.

Lizzie walks out of the memory then enters a door not far from the memory she just searched.

"Please let this be it." Lizzie murmurs before walking into a different memory

Hope's with her mother again, yet they're both restrained, Hope with magic blocking shackles and Hayley tied to a chair.

"I'm an idiot." Hope blurts randomly and Hayley looks at her sympathetically.

"I actually thought that he genuinely liked me. I feel so stupid." Hope is upset as she talks about an unknown male.

"You're not stupid, Hope. You're normal." Hayley assures her daughter, who shakes her head.

"I don't want to be normal. Not if it means wounding up feeling like an idiot." Hope exclaims bitterly and still upset.

At that moment, Roman walks in the room, and Hope legit lets out a low growl at his presence, that he didn't seem to notice.

"Good, you're still here. Didn't want you to go running off or anything." Roman feigns nervousness of them leaving after being glad they were still there and this causes Hope to scoff.

"Right. Let-let me think about that. I am being held hostage by a jerkwad of a vampire captor, next to my hard-to-release mother, and the only thing that I have as a form of protection is being blocked by these shackles you slapped on my wrists. Hmm, yep, I should've just broke the window then stole your car, leaving my mother here, all under the assumption that you wouldn't hear or catch me." Hope retorts with a very large amount of sarcasm that makes both Hayley and Lizzie chuckle but Roman to look threateningly serious at her.

"You know, your sarcasm isn't going to get you very far. You're just lucky my mother isn't here." Roman warns Hope, who glares intently at him but says nothing else, fearing that he might kill her if she does say anything else.

"Just let us go. A part of you must find it stupid, hating someone because of their species." Hayley tries to persuade him but he remains with his beliefs.

"You don't understand. A hybrid is unnatural, they goes against nature even more than vampires do." Roman starts to explain causing Hope to scoff again.

"Well, at least I know how you really feel." Hope mutters under her breath bitterly and Roman looks at her with sympathy, not that she knows as she's looking at the ground.

"Then explain it to me." Hayley demands then chuckles darkly.

"Before death befalls you. It might not be by my hands but it will happen. A part of you knows that, especially since I'm sure you know all about her father." Hayley threatens him as she motions to Hope, mainly because she has nothing to lose since she knows that he won't kill her.

Roman seems to realize that she makes a good point since he walks over to her cautiously.

"I can't let you go. Not yet. Hope agreed to it." Roman claims, sounding nervous which makes Hayley confused.

"Agreed to what?" Hayley looks at Hope, who frowns, confused.

"A binding spell. I agreed to have my werewolf side bound, in order to get you back." Hope reveals, horrifying Hayley and shocking Lizzie who watches the memory intently.

"Once she completes it, you'll be free to go. I promise. My mother promised me that we'll let you go once you complete the binding spell." Roman reassures them that they will be safe so long as they bind their werewolf sides but Hayley scoffs at this.

"Your mother doesn't want to bind us Roman. She just wants to kill us." Hayley sighs out both exhausted and exasperated.

"No, your wrong. You'll see that she just wants you bound then the two of you can go home." Roman is eager to believe his mother's words and this causes Hayley to realize that he feels like he owes her something.

"What did she do? You are dangerously loyal to a sociopath, so what did she do to earn that loyalty?" Hayley wonders curiously as Roman scoffs at this question.

"She's not a sociopath. 93 years ago, my entire village was slaughtered, Greta found me, and she turned me. Although distant at first, she eventually started to love me. She's a good mother." Roman tells them some of his past before claiming that Greta's a good person.

"No, she's not. She asks of you what no mother should." Hayley is exhausted yet continues to try and talk Roman down.

"Uh, I-I'll be right back. My mother should be here by now." Roman walks outside in order to make a phone call.

The moment the door closes, Hope immediately tries to untie her mother.

"I think I'm talking him down." Hayley believes but Hope shakes her head.

"You're using the tactics cops use to talk down an aggressive yet confused murderer on somebody who is completely delusional as a result of probably being brainwashed by his own mother." Hope insults Roman as well as assures her mother it isn't working but Hayley shakes her head.

"He's blindly loyal, yes. But he's not going to kill us, he's not going to let his mother kill us either." Hayley seems certain of this.

"What makes you so sure of that?" Hope asks, confused by her mother's certainty.

"Because of you. He won't let us die because of you." Hayley admits but Hope scoffs.

"I think you're becoming delusional too. Don't worry, nothing that can't be fixed with a little blood." Hope assumes, this causing Hayley to chuckle.

"I'm not delusional. I see the way that he looks at you, and it's obvious that he doesn't enjoy doing this one bit. He just doesn't know how to care about you while he's still under his mother's rule." Hayley explains and it's obvious that a part of Hope truly wants to believe her mother, but she's still skeptical.

"You really think so?" Hope looks at her sadly.

"Trust me, I know so." Hayley assures her causing Hope to smile at her slightly.

Lizzie realizes that she got distracted watching the memory, so she shakes it off then rushes over to Hope.

"Hope, look at me. Hope, it's Lizzie, you have to wake up, okay." Lizzie tries to get her attention and although Hope does look at her like she hears her voice, she fades away.

Lizzie wakes up in the salt circle causing her to sit up, only to see that everyone's looking at her.

"Did you find her?" Landon wonders curiously and Lizzie shakes her head.

"No, I thought that I had her but she just vanished before my eyes. Also, I ran out of magic." Lizzie points out sadly which causes Josie to frown.

"Well, since that took a long while, Rebekah texted me. She says that her plane just landed and she'll be here soon." Alaric informs them all, which makes them all happy.

Josie pulls Lizzie to the side so they can talk.

"What did you see?" Josie questions, clearly curious.

"I managed to see four memories. The first one was with her father when she was a kid. The second one, she was with her father again but as a teen, then the third one she was a child again yet with her mother. And the last one, she was a teenager with her mother and Roman. I think it was a memory that happened sometime before her mother died." Lizzie explains, shocking Josie before they turn to look at Hope's coffin, which is still open, sadly.

An hour later, Rebekah is walking around the school.

"Alaric Saltzman. Do you know where he is?" Rebekah asks a passing by student, who nods.

"I saw him enter the library a couple hours ago." the student replies then walks away, not telling her where the library is so she huffs in annoyance then walks around the school, looking for the library.

Eventually, she finds it and walks in, only to stare in horror of Hope in a coffin.

"What the bloody hell happened?" Rebekah looks horrified of her niece's state as her tone sounds angry and betrayed, since Alaric didn't tell her exactly what happened to Hope.


	20. The Truth that Only Love Can Reveal

Alaric explains to Rebekah exactly what happened, with the students piping up on what he forgot, and Rebekah is completely shocked by all of it, especially the fact that her niece is now a vampire.

"Okay. So, what exactly do you want me to do?" Rebekah asks, seeming to have processed all the information that she was given.

"I need to perform a spell that will let two people in her mind and find her. The only way I can do that, is if I'm channeling a power source that's blood related to her. That's where you come in." Lizzie explains as she prepares to do the spell again and Rebekah nods in understanding of this.

"Why are you sending two people in?" Rebekah wonders and before Lizzie can tell her, Josie jumps in.

"One person needs to find and stay with her. The second person returns to tell us we can heal the body. If we don't, she's permanently dead." Josie informs Hope's aunt and she nods in understanding again.

"Okay, well, I'm sending Penelope in, because she knows the spell to leave a person's mind. Who's going to be the second person?" Lizzie questions, looking around the room.

"I'll do it." Josie states plainly and Lizzie nods, not wanting to argue on the subject.

"So what, we just search her mind until we find her?" Penelope looks confused yet seems it will be simple but Lizzie shakes her head.

"No, there's a lot of memories. It will take too long to just randomly search, especially since I'm siphoning Rebekah's power to do the spell." Lizzie claims, catching their attention.

"What does that mean?" Rebekah looks at Lizzie curiously causing Lizzie to sigh.

"It means, the more doors they open and enter, the more power I'll have to use to sustain them. So, try not to open too many doors. Just think about Hope, and where you think she might be." Lizzie advises causing Penelope and Josie to nod their heads.

So, Penelope and Josie lie down in the circle as Lizzie holds Rebekah's hands, starting to siphon her power, then she performs the spell once more while standing over Hope's coffin.

Penelope and Josie wake up in the white hallway full of doors, immediately getting intimidated by the sight.

"Okay, where would Hope be?" Penelope starts looking around, along with Josie, who seems hesitant.

"I don't like this. It feels like I'm invading her privacy." Josie shares her feelings on the matter causing Penelope to roll her eyes.

"You didn't have to come Jo Jo. I mean, Landon is her boyfriend so he should know her best. Outside of her family, that is." Penelope makes a snarky remark after telling Josie she didn't need to enter Hope's mind.

"I know I didn't have to. I wanted to." Josie admits, shocking Penelope before she scoffs.

"You know, the Josie I know wouldn't have done something this risky." Penelope exclaims and this time Josie scoffs as she rolls her eyes.

"Yeah well, that's because I wouldn't have done it for you." Josie retorts bitterly then keeps walking, leaving Penelope behind and hurt by this statement.

Penelope catches up to her when she stops at a door.

"Is this it?" Penelope wonders and Josie shrugs.

"I have no idea. Let's find out." Josie says then opens the door that her and Penelope enter.

All of a sudden the two of them are in Boarding School, where Hope is sitting on her bed with Roman lounging on the floor.

"Okay, hot-shot. Narcissistic Personality Disorder." Roman has flash cards in his hands as he quizzes her in psychology.

"Narcissistic Personality Disorder, also known as NPD, is a disorder in which someone is born with and they think everything is about them. Someone with this disorder has an incapacity for caring about others, including their families, and it cannot be fixed in any way." Hope gives him the definition and he tosses the card to the side in a huff before bitterly searching through the flashcards.

"Ooh, okay. Dependent Personality Disorder." Roman reads a different card to her, praying she won't get.

"Dependent Personality Disorder, or DPD, is a disorder that leaves a person unable to make decisions, constantly needing approval of somebody they're close to. They are incapable of being alone and need someone with them to help them make decisions, no matter how simple they are. Like, should they use the bathroom, or something." Hope tells him the definition of the disorder and it's obvious that he's getting annoyed as he searches through the cards again.

"Alright. Paranoid Personality Disorder." Roman is near the last card, having skipped most of them in order to challenge Hope.

"Paranoid Personality Disorder, also known as PPD, includes having odd ways of thinking. The constantly suffer from paranoia and have a restless mistrust in people, constantly being suspicious when there's nothing suspicious actually going on." Hope's tone sounds mildly bored yet amused hearing Roman get annoyed.

"Last one. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder." Roman shoots out the last card and seems to feel slightly victorious when Hope doesn't answer immediately.

"Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, or PTSD, is a common disorder that surfaces when someone experiences or witnesses something terrible. It leaves a mark both mentally and physically as a result and can sometimes reappear to that person via flashes and can also give them an inability to sleep." Hope sits up on her bed as Roman sits up on the floor.

"Damn. Maybe Mr. Philips can give you my seat in psychology. How did you know all of that?" Roman asks as she laughs at the statement before the question.

"I have an incessant need to prove people, who say I can't do something, wrong. I might have a personality disorder or something." Hope assumes before giggling which proves to Roman that it was a joke, since he starts laughing with her.

"Well, I have to go. I got soccer, but I'll see you around." Roman claims as he packs his backpack then waves at Hope, who smiles in return.

"Always nice pissing you off and showing you up in study sessions." Hope calls out after him causing him turn to face her again.

"You don't always show me up." Roman defends himself but Hope just chuckles at him.

"Bye, Roman." Hope waves at him so he leaves, not realizing all the books at the side of her bed, which she glances over at.

"Hope. Look at me, it's Josie." Josie tries to catch her attention yet to no avail, so her and Penelope leave the memory.

"That memory was kind of, I don't know, cute." Penelope shares her opinion on the memory and Josie nods in agreement.

"Wait. This is still a mind, therefore I should be able to…" Josie trails off as she concentrates then all of doors disappear until there are only two, one of them has a checkmark in a box on it while the other door just has an empty box on it.

"What did you just do?" Penelope looks impressed yet sounds confused.

"Made it easier. The checkmarked door is all of the memories that were seen and the other well, has the ones we haven't." Josie explains before walking towards the unchecked door with Penelope following, until the two doors disappear and return the abundance of doors that were there before.

"It appears that her mind doesn't like your organization tactics." Penelope points out grumpily and Josie pouts.

"Not like it matters, there were probably going to be like a million doors behind the unchecked one anyway." Penelope tries to reassure Josie that although her organization was brilliant, it was also kind of pointless, before she realizes that Josie's walking away from her.

"Hey, where are you going?" Penelope jogs to catch up to Josie, who continues to walk and look at each door she passes.

"Shouldn't we be checking these doors?" Penelope looks confused by Josie just ignoring the doors they pass even though she's looking at them.

"Shh. I'm trying to listen." Josie shushes Penelope as she places her ear near a door.

"What are you…" Penelope starts but gets cut off.

"Shh." Josie shushes her again as she continues to intently listen, then moves onto the next door, putting her ear near that one too.

Penelope rolls her eyes and crosses her arms, waiting for Josie to finish listening to the doors, while walking with her.

They reach a door that looks like a wormhole from outer space that makes them confused.

"Is this where she is?" Penelope looks at the door questioningly and Josie just simply shrugs.

They walk through the door, only to see Hope lying in a very dark area before she gets to her feet.

"Hello? Hello! Where am I?" Hope looks at her surroundings frantically looking for a way out when she hears a noise.

"Who's there?" Hope sounds and looks nervous when she sees Ryan Clarke come out from the shadows.

"You are very loud. As for the where are you question, welcome to Malivore." Ryan extends his arms out in the darkness as though he's a tour guide welcoming a new comer.

"Do you hear that?" Hope asks looking around, hearing a bunch of whispers and Ryan just smirks at her confusion.

"Those are the whispers of the other prisoners. Now that you're here, Malivore will fall apart and most of those prisoners will find peace." Ryan explains causing Hope to be more confused.

"I don't understand. What do you mean 'most'?" Hope questions very confused which keeps Ryan smirking at her lack of knowledge.

"Well, the Arachnes and the golems, like myself, will be sucked to oblivion, yet all we know is that it will be more peaceful than this. But the rest will find peace like the dragons, the dryads, and even the gargoyles. I say we have somewhere between 3 and 8 months before this entire place collapses with your fate forever remaining unknown." Ryan assumes Hope's fate after estimating how much time they'll have and explaining what most means.

"If you want, I can stay with you until this place collapses." Ryan suggests and Hope starts to profusely nod her head in agreement.

"Could you?" Hope wonders and Ryan just smirks at her in response.

"You took me down here with you. I think it's only fitting that you suffer here, alone." Ryan claims then backs into the darkness with Hope taking a couple steps forward.

"Ryan? Ryan!" Hope shouts but he doesn't return, so she looks around in her new cell, terrified.

Josie and Penelope both try to get Hope's attention but it doesn't work and they realize that they can't leave as the memory isn't over yet.

An unknown amount of time passes, then they see Hope sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth, scared, a little frantic, and whispering a child's nursery rhyme.

"Hush little baby, don't say a word, mama's gonna buy you a mockingbird, if that mockingbird don't sing, daddy's gonna buy you a diamond ring." Hope whispers to herself before continuing to hum it when she hears footsteps.

"Who is that?" Hope immediately stands to her feet, getting in a defensive position, when Ryan Clarke returns.

"Bad news Hope, this place is disintegrating. You're going to help me get out of here." Ryan claims and Hope looks confident yet also intimidated.

"I've been trying to find a way out for, however long I've been here. I can't help you. Even if I did know the way out, I wouldn't tell you. You left me here alone after I agreed that you could stay." Hope remarks snarkily, crossing her arms and tilting her head to the side.

"Let bygones be bygones. Now, help me get out of here." Ryan demands after telling her to let him leaving her there go.

So, the two of them are walking around in the dark pit, looking for a way out and occasionally hearing screeches of an Arachne getting sucked away, or screams of golems getting sucked away as well.

After a few hours, Hope sighs in frustration.

"It's no use. Like I said, there's no way out." Hope reminds her companion as her back is turned to him so she doesn't notice, or even hear, him take off his belt.

"Well, that's a real shame. Because that means it's the end of the line for you." Ryan attacks her, wrapping his belt around her neck, which she immediately attempts to remove.

"I know how hybrids work and you're no different. Vampire blood only restores you if you have your heart or your head attached, and well, since I can't remove something that you don't have, decapitation seems like my best bet." Ryan threatens, gritting through his teeth as Hope flails, gasping for air, and trying to remove his belt from her neck.

Penelope and Josie feel offended by Ryan's words, as he had implied that Hope didn't have a heart before continuing to strangle her with his belt.

The struggle of Ryan trying to decapitate Hope goes on for a while, actually, it's to the point that blood is dripping from the bottom of the belt while some pools over the top of it, meaning her head coming off is probably going to happen soon.

Hope continues to try to fight Ryan, even while she's near decapitation, but the fight ends when Ryan is removed from her by an unknown source and kicked into darkness.

Hope gasps for breath, finally removing the belt from her neck as she falls to her knees.

A few seconds later, the person who rescued her, helps her to her feet.

"Seylah?" Hope looks at her and she smiles.

"So, how's Landon?" Seylah wonders causing Hope to nervously smile at her.

"Well, since I jumped in here, I can only imagine that he's safe." Hope assures Seylah, who smiles at this.

"Thank you for saving me. A moment longer and I would've been done for." Hope massages her neck, that heals slowly.

"Well, it's the least that I could do. So, we both jumped into Malivore to save Landon?" Seylah obviously has a lot of questions for Hope from the last time they each other.

So, seeing that Seylah has questions, Hope just tells her exactly what happened, how she's in Malivore, and why she took Ryan Clarke down with her yet Seylah can sense that Hope is leaving something out.

"Why do I get the feeling you left something out?" Seylah calls her out and Hope just sighs, realizing she can't lie.

"Well, there was this girl. A good friend of mine. Yeah, she was shot with Malivore mud on a bullet. The man who was with me, Dr. Saltzman, was her father. Last I knew, he went to give her my blood but she was having hallucinations, so he gave my blood to her sister yet he told me her condition remained unknown. I jumped in here assuming that she was dead. It was actually the headmaster's words about her condition that allowed me to make the decision of jumping in here clearer." Hope explains, her voice thickening with emotion as she speaks about Josie.

"And what was this clearly special girl's name?" Seylah asks, looking at Hope sympathetically.

"Josie. Her name was Josie." Hope says, her eyes glistening at thought of Josie being dead.

"Unfortunately, if I ever did see her again, she wouldn't even remember me." Hope looks sad at this fact and Josie looks emotional as she watches this memory.

However, this moment is broken when Ryan returns from wherever Seylah kicked him to.

Before Ryan can threaten or attempt to kill either of them, a dark hole appears and starts sucking Seylah in as well as Ryan.

Hope grabs Seylah, bringing her to her feet then starts reaching for Ryan.

"Hope, please." Ryan looks desperate as he tries to reach for Hope, who smirks devilishly at him.

"Let bygones be bygones." Hope repeats his words in a snarky fashion before walking over and kicking him in the portal then throws his belt in as well just before it closes, making her look smug with her actions.

"I'm Malivore's loophole. Ryan said minus the Arachnes and the golems, everyone else will find peace. But I don't know what's going to happen to me." Hope starts tearing up and Seylah just smiles warmly.

"Neither do I. Just pray that it's a good place, where you go. My time to find peace has come. Goodbye, Hope." Seylah raises her arms to the sky then gets pulled up into the darkness with Hope smiling on before getting frantic.

She starts walking around to find a way out before she hears rumbling and things falling.

"Oh no. Oh god, please no." Hope starts to cry as she prays that Malivore isn't falling apart then she hears rumbling above her.

Hope looks up, only to see darkness that would resemble a concrete ceiling falling, getting closer to her.

"Ahh!" Hope screams as it falls until she gets hit with it.

Josie and Penelope leave the memory, shocked by the events in it.

"That explains her male victims even better." Josie points out after the initial shock and Penelope nods in agreement.

The two decide to keep walking down the hall before another door catches their attention but Penelope grabs Josie's arm.

"Remember, the more doors we open, the more strain it puts on Lizzie." Penelope reminds Josie, who nods in agreement.

"I know. Just one last door." Josie assures Penelope, who sighs then nods at her.

So the two of them walk through the door, only to be back in the Boarding School.

Roman is in Hope's dorm room again, lounging on the bed this time, clearly waiting for something.

"What the hell are you doing here?" Hope has just gotten out of the shower as she's in a robe, looking appalled at the sight of Roman on her bed.

"Um, well, uh, I thought that maybe we could, like, get lunch, or something." Roman is way more awkward and nervous around Hope than he usually is around other students, which Josie and Penelope take notice of.

Hope looks skeptical of him being in her dorm room but also seems nervous as well.

"Oh, um I was going to…" Hope stops herself from talking which catches Roman's attention.

"You know what, sure. We can get lunch. Just let me get dressed and I'll be right back." Hope assures Roman, who nods and smiles at her, then she walks into the bathroom to get changed.

When she walks out in lounge clothes, Roman has set up a picnic in her dorm room, which she seems to appreciate.

"We could eat outside, too." Roman's making an idiot of himself being dorky and Hope laughs nervously.

"We could but I don't feel like it. This is fine." Hope exclaims making Roman smile nervously at her which she returns the smile.

The rest of the memory is Hope and Roman having a picnic date, teasing each other, and making really bad jokes that the other finds funny.

Josie and Penelope leave the memory, seeming happy from seeing Hope smile.

"Alright, no more doors." Josie informs her companion, who nods in agreement.

"I know. But Hope and Roman are kind of, really cute." Penelope admits, clearly shipping it, which Josie can agree on, shipping it as well.

However, they continue walking down the hallway, not opening any other doors, no matter how intriguing the memories might be.

Then suddenly, there are no more doors, just a long, white, empty hallway that has both Penelope and Josie frowning in confusion.

They look at each other, confused, before walking down the hallway and after a while, they see a black door at the end of the hall.

The two of them continue to walk down the hall until they reach the door.

"Please, don't be in here." Josie murmurs under her breath then opens the door and walks inside.

She's on a staircase surrounded by darkness so she starts walking down the steps, as Penelope follows behind her.

All of a sudden, the stairs just abruptly stop, unbeknownst to Josie, who figures it out when she falls into the abyss of darkness with Penelope not far behind her.

They scream for what feels like hours until they hit the ground, causing them to grunt in pain.

"Ughh." Penelope grunts then manages to stand up in the darkness as Josie does the same.

"Where are we?" Josie wonders as she looks around, trying to see something.

"Well, we're definitely not in Kansas anymore, Jo Jo." Penelope says teasingly, quoting the Wizard of OZ, which Josie chuckles at.

"What are you two doing here?" Hope's voice comes from behind them causing them to turn around.

"Looking for you." Josie states plainly as though it were obvious.

"We can get you out." Penelope exclaims assuringly and Josie nods at this.

"Exactly. Now, if we can only get back to that hallway." Josie looks up to see where they fell, curiously as she doesn't see anything but the darkness.

"Well, I guess I should thank you. I honestly thought you wouldn't have understood the whole coffin opening on its own." Hope reveals, admitting she actually was behind it.

"Alright, Penelope. You can leave, tell Lizzie it's okay to heal her body." Josie orders Penelope, who nods then casts the spell to leave Hope's mindscape.

"Any ideas on how to get to the top?" Josie looks at Hope, who smiles then pulls Josie closer before snapping her fingers, put them at the bottom step of the stairs Josie fell off of.

"Well, there's that." Josie remarks, sounding impressed yet mildly embarrassed that she didn't think of it herself.

They head up the stairs and re-enter the white hallway, which both of them have to squint at until their eyes adjust.

"Hey. Thank you for helping me. I really appreciate it." Hope admits to Josie, who is very shocked by this confession.

"You're welcome." Josie says with a warm smile at Hope, who returns it, before she disappears.

Josie wakes up in the circle, then sits up and rushes over to Lizzie, who is in the process of healing Hope's body since the spear was removed from her chest at some point.

Once the healing spell is complete, Hope wakes up almost immediately, gasping for air.

"He's a dead man." Hope declares, gritting through her teeth, as she sits up in the coffin.

"Can you at least give me a hug before you murder someone?" Rebekah suggests, shocking Hope by her presence.

"Aunt Rebekah." Hope exclaims, looking very happy to see her aunt.

She struggles getting out of the coffin, yet when she does she embraces her aunt in a big hug, that Rebekah reciprocates happily.

"Good news, I think I found it." Rebekah claims after the hug breaks, which has Hope smile broadly.

"Really?" Hope's smile gets broader by this statement.

"Yes. Well, maybe. I don't know, I've got to have your aunt Freya examine it to ensure it's legit but I have one." Rebekah exclaims happily.

"You'll tell me if it is?" Hope looks at her for reassurance and Rebekah nods in agreement.

"I promise. I've got to go. So happy I can help." Rebekah is grateful for being able to help Hope after she promises her niece that she'll call then she leaves the library.

""Your aunt is kind of attractive." Rafael awkwardly points out as he motions to the library doors that Rebekah just left from.

This comment makes the room go silent in awkwardness and feel slightly weirded out.

"You know what we need?" Lizzie questions, breaking the awkward silence of Rafael's comment.

"Um, pancakes?" MG wonders curiously, implying that he's hungry.

"No." Lizzie states plainly.

"Besides, I'm more of a waffle person." Josie reveals, realizing that she's hungry as well, grabbing her stomach as it rumbles.

"Well, we can go to Denny's. And then, we go dancing." Lizzie exclaims happily and the room seems to agree to this so they leave for Denny's then dancing.


End file.
